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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24931738">The Bandit of the Wolf's Hood</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cragamiel/pseuds/Cragamiel'>Cragamiel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>A Song of Ice and Fire &amp; Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Robin Hood AU, Robin Hood!Arya, Sheriff!Gendry, gendrya bigbang 2020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 06:27:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>32,900</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24931738</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cragamiel/pseuds/Cragamiel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Gendry Waters has been given a task by Queen Cersei herself: track down the outlaw who has been robbing royal tax caravans in Sherwood Forest, and bring them to justice. If he succeeds, she will make him a true Baratheon, and finally he will have a family, just like he always wanted.</p><p>Arya's home and family are lost to her, casualties to the war against the Dragon Queen raging somewhere far away in the south. She tries to honor them the only way she can think of: by sabotaging the queen who brought their deaths about, whose war tore her family away from her. And as it turned out, she's actually quite good at it. So good, she has earned herself a bit of a reputation in Sherwood Forest...</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Arya Stark/Gendry Waters</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>61</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>161</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>Find the bandit leader. Bring them to the Queen’s justice.</em>
</p><p>Gendry repeated the words to himself the whole way from London to Nottingham. He didn’t think he would forget them, but he didn’t want to take the chance, either. They were too important.</p><p>They rang through him with each step of his horse, out of London, through the midlands, all the way into the courtyard at Nottingham Castle. When finally he dismounted there, he shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and thought it one more time: <em>Find the bandit leader. Bring them to the Queen’s justice.</em></p><p>He savored the feeling of purpose for a moment, then opened his eyes. The courtyard was alive with guardsmen and servants going about their daily work and finalizing the preparations for his arrival. It was a strange feeling, being the one served instead of the servant himself, and it wasn’t one he entirely liked. He caught sight of the castle steward and asked him if there was any part of the work he could help with.</p><p>The man frowned and began shaking his head even before Gendry had finished the question. “No, sheriff, ser, the servants will take care of it. You’ve your own concerns.”</p><p>Gendry couldn’t tell him that he didn't have much idea about what, specifically, his concerns were yet, so he just nodded and returned to his horse, thinking to at least stable it himself. Instead, he found that a stable hand had already led the mare away.</p><p><em>Well then.</em> He turned towards the castle gates. <em>Might as well get started.</em></p><p>He'd had a long ride over the past few days during which to think about how to begin his search. At home, he remembered how much the smallfolk enjoyed talking about anyone halfway famous, and anyone with the thrill of notoriety to them--people like the bandit in Sherwood Forest. Nottingham wasn't London, but he didn't imagine that people were so very different here.</p><p>The sun burned low in the sky, but the town was still lively. The air was thick with chatter and the sound of a flute spilling from a nearby alehouse, and the streets were full of townspeople chatting, finishing their work, heading home, rushing to the alehouse. Gendry almost immediately felt almost as underfoot as he had in the courtyard. He hesitated at the corner, unsure where to go, where anything was, who to talk to.</p><p>“You new in town?”</p><p>He looked down. A young woman stood before him, with a northern accent and grey eyes like steel. “How’d you know?”</p><p>“The way you're standing around staring, it's easy to tell.” She looked him over, taking in his new shoes and fine clothes. “Are you from the castle? Has the new sheriff arrived yet? I heard he has.”</p><p>“Er—yeah. Yes.” He coughed, unsure why he felt so embarrassed. “Actually, I am the sheriff.”</p><p>She examined him for a second more, then gave him a quick curtsy. “Then welcome to Nottingham, ser. I’d offer you a roll, but I’ve sold out,” she added, gesturing to the empty basket in her other hand. “You know, you're younger than we expected.”</p><p>"Am I?"</p><p>"The last sheriff was nearly seventy. He wasn't very good at his job, to be honest."</p><p>“Ah.” He straightened, trying to feel like a sheriff. “I suppose you're referring to the bandits out in the forest? How he wasn’t able to catch any of them?”</p><p>Her mouth twitched. “I suppose so.”</p><p>“I aim to have them behind bars soon, and then you won’t have to worry about them anymore.”</p><p>“What makes you think I’m worried, ser?”</p><p>“I—well—they’re bandits. Aren’t you worried about them?”</p><p>She shrugged. “Not particularly.”</p><p>“Why not?”</p><p>She grinned. “Maybe they’re friends of mine.”</p><p>He tried to not grin too; surely it wouldn’t do for the sheriff to enjoy jokes about bandits. “But they take your money.”</p><p>“No, they take tax money. It’s not our money anymore, after the tax collector takes it. It’s the queen’s.”</p><p>“I—well, yes. That’s true.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Do you know much about them?”</p><p>“About the bandits?” There was something sharp in her smile, like a needle. “As much as anybody. But, please, ser, as much as I’d like to help, I really must be going.” She nodded toward the darkening sky.</p><p>“Of course, of course—thank you, miss…?”</p><p>But she was gone, strolling on down the street, swinging her empty basket. He waited where he was for a moment, watching the gleam of the sun catching on her brown braid. Only when she disappeared into the crowd did he return through the gates to his keep.</p><p>Out of his sight, she kept walking right out of the town gates, returning to where she'd tethered her horse, hidden behind a small copse of trees. She rode him out to a small cottage, a mile outside of town, whose windows glowed warm with firelight.</p><p>She slipped a small coinpurse into the empty basket she’d carried in the town and left it on the sill of an open window, trying not to make any noise; she didn't want to take the time to stop and chat tonight. The old woman sitting inside at her loom never even looked up.</p><p>She mounted up and left the cottage at a fast lope, heading into Sherwood Forest, her thoughts drifting as she settled into the horse’s rocking gait.</p><p><em>So that’s the new sheriff.</em> He hadn’t struck her as any of the things she expected from someone Cersei Lannister had appointed. He didn’t seem mean, ill-tempered, or greedy.</p><p><em>That doesn’t mean he isn’t any of those things,</em> she told herself. <em>You only spoke to him for a minute. He can’t possibly be a decent person if he’s loyal to Cersei, and he has to be loyal to her, or she wouldn’t have sent him. </em></p><p>She turned down a dry creek bed, wound through a narrow gully, pushed her horse up over the rocky slope past it, and ducked her head as they pushed through a thick stand of trees—and then the branches rustled, and an arrowhead poked out of the foliage.</p><p>“It’s me,” she said, unfazed.</p><p>“Oh, hi Arry,” said Lommy’s voice as the arrowhead disappeared. “Didn’t expect you back so soon.”</p><p>“It was easier than I expected. I met the man himself, almost as soon as he arrived.” Arya nudged her horse on through. Branches snapped as Lommy trotted along behind, and soon they came out into a sheltered clearing. Her companions gathered around, rising from their pallets or standing from their work as she dismounted and loosened her saddle.</p><p>“Well?” asked Little Jon, who looked like her brother Jon, but taller and with lighter hair. “What was he like?”</p><p>She shrugged. “Hard to say for sure yet, but he seemed normal enough. I don’t think he’ll be anything to worry about.”</p><p>“So we go on as we have been, then?”</p><p>“Just as we have been,” she confirmed.</p><p>The group dispersed, disappointed by the lack of interesting news. Arya busied herself checking the fletching on her arrows, waiting for Hot Pie to return with dinner. But when he did arrive, he was red-faced and puffing so hard he could barely speak.</p><p>“What the hell’s the matter?” asked Anguy, aghast, catching Hot Pie when he nearly toppled over. “Did you run all the way here from the village?”</p><p>Hot Pie tried to speak. “I—he’s—the pr—Cer—no—”</p><p>“Someone get him some water,” Arya called. “You have to breathe, Hot Pie. Just take a deep—”</p><p>He shook his head. “Can’t—too big—big news—”</p><p>“What news?”</p><p>“The pr—prince is coming,” he managed. “Coming to—Sherwood.”</p><p>The clearing erupted with a flood of questions. Arya leaned closer to Hot Pie, trying to hear through it. “Which prince? Joffrey? Or Tommen?”</p><p>“Joffrey.” Hot Pie took the waterskin Lommy offered him and drank.</p><p>“Why is Joffrey coming to Sherwood?”</p><p>“Sorry—through Sherwood,” Hot Pie said, finally breathing in something like a normal tempo. “He’s supposed to be heading to Leeds.”</p><p>“Leeds?” repeated Lem. “Why? What’s in Leeds?”</p><p>“Something about some noble lady there—a Tully, I think she was.”</p><p>Arya felt suddenly cold. “A Tully? Or a Stark?”</p><p>“Oh—yes, maybe—oh.” Hot Pie stared at her. “Wait, isn’t that—”</p><p>The others pressed closer, still asking their own questions, and Arya slipped away between them. She headed into the forest to pace in the shadows of the trees, clenching and unclenching her hands. <em>Why would they want Sansa?</em></p><p><em>It must be about Jon.</em> It had to be. Last she had heard, the war in the south against the Dragon Queen was going poorly for England, in large part because of Jon's defection to the Dragon Queen's side. <em>They must be trying to find some way to get to Jon, and Sansa’s the only Stark they can find.</em></p><p>Arya stopped her pacing. <em>Let them try it. If they want to send Joffrey through my woods after my sister, let them. Let them see what comes when they do.</em></p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Gendry spent his full day in Nottingham walking through the town, trying to stop at every craftsperson and artisan and farmer pushing a cart, to speak with them for a moment and see what they would ask of their sheriff—bringing the bandits to justice, perhaps? But the only thing most seemed to want of him was silence. </p>
<p>At first, they greeted him warmly enough. Then he introduced himself—mentioned his title—and their eyes narrowed, or their shoulders stiffened, and they seemed to have little else to say to him. They replied to his questions in terse monosyllables or vague ramblings until he gave up and went to try the next person. </p>
<p>The pattern must have repeated itself a dozen times that morning, until he stopped into an alehouse for a break at noon. He sat alone, sipping on his mead and glaring at the pocked tabletop in front of him. <em>Does no one in this town trust their sheriff?</em></p>
<p>He had only just arrived. Could he possibly have done something already to let them down? Surely not. Perhaps they held a grudge against the last sheriff. The girl from yesterday hadn't seemed to think much of him; perhaps the rest of the townspeople thought the same.</p>
<p>Gendry tilted his flagon this way and that, watching the liquid gleaming within. Perhaps it was the office itself they distrusted. He remembered well how, in his own childhood in the slums of London, the city guard had been regarded with more fear, wariness, and anger more than anything else. Perhaps if his father hadn’t taken him in, he would have thought just as they did. </p>
<p>He could understand that, then. He had been raised as one of the smallfolk, after all. He wondered if it would help to tell people that, but almost as soon as the thought occurred to him, he brushed it aside. He would have to explain more of his life story than he was comfortable with; he didn’t relish the idea of letting the whole town know that he was a bastard, even if his father had been the late king.</p>
<p>The sun tipped past noon, and Gendry went out to try again, with no more success. Perhaps he needed to try a different tack. He bought some pastries from the vendor he had been trying to speak to and scanned the edge of the street. There--a pair of young children crouched beneath a window, playing some game with pebbles. From the state of their clothes and the thick, caked-on layers of dirt they wore, he would wager that they had no homes. He went up to them and offered the pastries.</p>
<p>They received them with delight, and did not protest when Gendry sat down next to them and prodded at one of their pebbles. “I’m your new sheriff,” he told them as they ate. “Sheriff Gendry, you can call me.”</p>
<p>The older child gave him a sidelong look, but both were too preoccupied with the pastries to reply. Gendry pressed on. “Is there anything going on in town you think I should be helping with? The bandits, maybe?”</p>
<p>The older child snorted. “What, do you think you’re going to stop them?”</p>
<p>“Well, yes, I do. Do you think I can’t? Why not?”</p>
<p>“Because they’re good,” said the child. “And the good people always win, my ma used to say.”</p>
<p>“Bandits aren’t good,” Gendry told him. “They’re criminals. Thieves.”</p>
<p>The child jutted his chin out. “These ones are good.”</p>
<p>Gendry wasn't sure what to make of that. “Is that why no one wants to tell me about them?”</p>
<p>The younger child began to tug on the elder’s tunic, whispering in his ear. He took her hand and said, “My sister’s thirsty, so we have to go. Thank you for the food, Sheriff Gendry.”</p>
<p>The pair was off before Gendry could offer them his own waterskin. He frowned after them. If he saw them again, perhaps he could offer them more food, and water, and maybe help them find somewhere to stay. He didn't like to see children that young on their own. He'd seen too many of them in London.</p>
<p>The sun had begun to brush the rooftops, and Gendry turned his steps toward the castle. Perhaps he would have better luck tomorrow—though he doubted it.</p>
<p>The guards greeted him with nods as he approached the gate, and he stopped in his tracks, looking them over. They were both young, and likely locals—perhaps they would be forthcoming, to their sheriff. “Good evening, lads,” he said. “Can I ask you something?"</p>
<p>They exchanged a look, apparently surprised to be addressed. "Of course, ser."</p>
<p>“Why don’t the townspeople want to speak to me?”</p>
<p>The guard on the right rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, ser, they weren’t fond of the last sheriff.”</p>
<p>“But I’m not the last sheriff.”</p>
<p>“Well, no, ser, but they’re probably scared it’ll be the same.”</p>
<p>The guard on the left shot him a sharp look, as if telling him not to go on. “The same?” Gendry said. </p>
<p>“Taxes have been going up quite a bit, the last year or so, ser. A lot of the manor have had trouble paying. And the tax collectors get real rough about it sometimes, too.”</p>
<p>“The tax rate comes from the crown, not the sheriff,” Gendry pointed out. </p>
<p>The man shrugged. “Try telling this lot that. The sheriff’s the one who announces it, so he’s the one that does it.”</p>
<p>Gendry thanked the guards and bid them goodnight. He stopped only briefly by the barracks to confirm his plans for the next night with the captain of the guard, then retired, collapsing onto his bed with a huff.</p>
<p>His chest felt heavy. He couldn’t blame the townspeople for what they thought of him. In all honesty, he probably would’ve thought the same, in their shoes. He just had to find some way to convince them otherwise. </p>
<p>He rolled over and tried to relax. He needed sleep, and plenty of it. He knew he wouldn’t have much the next night, after all.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya crouched in the brush, staring intently down the road. Lommy and Little Jon and the others were arrayed around her, to the sides and across the road. No one moved; no one made a sound as the night rustled around them.</p>
<p>Finally, a creaking, clattering noise approached. Arya tensed, narrowing her eyes as a covered wagon came trundling around the bend. She made sure her arrow was nocked, made sure her grip on her other arrows was secure. A short mantra played in her head, as she was sure it played in the others’ heads: <em>In and out. We get what we need. And then we go.</em></p>
<p>The wagon creaked closer Arya knew she was probably imagining it, but she thought she heard the silence deepen as all of her companions tensed, held their breaths, waited.</p>
<p>The wagon drew almost even with them. Arya drew her bow and nodded to Little Jon.</p>
<p>He charged out onto the road, shouting and waving his arms. The horses balked, their eyes rolling to the whites, trying to run from him but held fast by the yoke. The driver swore, trying to spur them back forward, but Arya's companions were running from their cover now too, descending on the cart from both sides. As they did, just as they had expected, guards began to jump out from within the wagon.</p>
<p>Arya loosed her arrow, landing it just before one of the guard’s feet. He jumped back with a high-pitched yelp. She allowed herself a grin, another arrow already on the string. She loosed again, this arrow catching the hem of the next man’s tunic, sending him scrambling back too.</p>
<p>She wasn’t the only one shooting; arrows flew from both sides of the road, taunting the guards more than hurting them. Meanwhile, Jon and the others were harrying them as well, jabbing here and there with spears and sword tips and dancing just out of the guards’ reach. She couldn’t see him, but Arya knew that Lommy would be slipping through the fray, grabbing a couple of bags out of the wagon, and then they would be—</p>
<p>He breath caught. She saw Lommy, but he was stumbling away from the wagon. Another man, taller and broader than the other guards, was advancing on him, sword in hand.</p>
<p>Arya swore, tugged her hood down closer over her face, and shoved through the brush into sight. “Oy!” she shouted, and the big man paused, turned. She shot an arrow past his ear, close enough for him to feel the wind of its passing. He leapt away with a cry, and Lommy seized his chance to scramble out of reach.</p>
<p>The big man stretched his head up over the commotion, finding Arya out by its edge. He shoved through towards her. She drew and held, waiting until he was at the edge of the fray. Before he could lift his sword, she loosed. Her arrow struck the pommel of his sword, just above his hand, and he dropped it with a hiss.</p>
<p>Beneath the scarf wrapped over her nose and mouth, Arya grinned. She drew her narrow sword, turning to hold her bow out of danger behind her.</p>
<p>Behind the man, Lommy was nowhere to be seen. Arya hoped he was in the wagon. </p>
<p>The man looked between her and his sword, laying on the ground. Slowly, he crouched to pick it up. Before he could straighten, Arya lunged. He barely got his sword up in time to knock hers aside, stumbling back in an effort to give himself room enough to fight.</p>
<p>So close to him, with the moonlight falling just so, Arya recognized him—the short dark hair, the strong features. Her stomach flipped. Her opponent was none other than the sheriff of Nottingham himself.</p>
<p>Distracted, she almost didn’t notice him lower his shoulder to charge her. She leapt back just in time, out of her reach and into his. She batted his next strike away.</p>
<p>He kept after her, his movements slow but powerful, and she kept darting around him, parrying when she had to and striking when she could. They were well matched, but she didn’t have to hold him off for long. She caught sight of Lommy standing by the edge of the road. He lifted his hands, two hefty sacks hanging from each. </p>
<p>She thrust aside the sheriff’s next strike, then whistled shrilly, the signal to retreat. Arrows began to fly from the brush once more, and as the guards dodged for cover, Arya and her companions ran towards the archers into the brush. </p>
<p>They navigated the nighttime forest by memory and luck, passing a few breathless minutes consumed with keeping their footing and their senses of direction. Usually Arya quite enjoyed his part—the wildness of it, the burn of her legs and the icy bite of the night wind—but tonight she couldn’t concentrate quite enough to enjoy it.</p>
<p><em>The sheriff. The sheriff himself came along—as a guard.</em> She checked her scarf and hood and found them secure, even after running. He probably hadn’t seen her face, then. Still—this was new, and not welcome. The old sheriff had stayed in his castle, letting the dirty work fall to the guardsmen; neither Arya nor any of her fellows had ever come face-to-face with him even in the town, much less out on a raid.</p>
<p><em>This one isn’t just another Lannister lackey.</em> The thought sat uncomfortably heavy in her chest, like a stone. They needed to know what they were dealing with.</p>
<p>Back at the wagon, Gendry stared at the pockmark on his sword where the bandit’s arrow had struck the pommel, thinking along the same lines as Arya. The encounter had not been what he had expected, either. <em>I imagined the leader would be… taller,</em> he found himself thinking, rather dumbly, as he stared after them into the shadowy forest. His men were trickling back from among the trees, having quickly lost the bandits into their own turf.</p>
<p>The person he’d fought with had to have been the leader. All of the bandits had worn scarves and grey hoods over their faces, but only one had worn a hood of wolfskin. And they had been so quick, so sure with sword and bow both…</p>
<p>Gendry frowned, rubbing the back of his neck, still unable to tear his eyes from the forest. <em>So this is my opponent.</em></p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I’m going to go find him. Watch him. Talk to him even, if I can,” Arya announced to the others the next morning. They all sat around the clearing breaking their fasts, and none of them had to ask who she was talking about. </p>
<p>“You’re sure he won’t figure you out?” asked Lommy.</p>
<p>“Of course not,” she replied. “Do you really think I’d let that happen?”</p>
<p>He shrugged. “Maybe he’ll see through you. He almost got me last night—seems like he’s pretty good.”</p>
<p>“I’m not sure just riding along with one of the tax wagons makes him good at anything,” Anguy pointed out. “But we do need to know, one way or another.”</p>
<p>Lommy huffed. “You’re just bitter that I had to save you,” Arya said.</p>
<p>The others laughed. Lommy grumbled something under his breath, then shoved a piece of toast into his mouth so he wouldn’t have to reply. Little Jon clapped him on the shoulder, trying to lessen the sting of their teasing.</p>
<p>Jon had clapped Bran on the shoulder the same way, when Arya had first beaten him in a practice duel. Suddenly, she felt very far away.</p>
<p>Shaking her head, trying to clear it, Arya went on. “We’ll keep planning for the next raid, next week. And I need more information about the prince’s visit.”</p>
<p>Little Jon nodded. “We’ll find out what we can.”</p>
<p>She nodded back. She had no doubt they could root out whatever they needed to know.</p>
<p>After she finished eating, Arya retreated to the little lean-to she slept in, rummaging through the bags of spare clothing she kept there. They were stuffed full with all kinds of clothes, and all the accoutrement she might need for each garment. She passed over her dress from the day before, a plain thing of pale blue roughspun wool, the attire of a working woman. She pulled out another similar dress and changed into it, tucking the ends of her skirts into her belt. </p>
<p>Back in the clearing, they had separated their takings from the tax wagon into a few dozen smaller purses. She scooped several of them into a rucksack, tacked up her horse, and headed towards town.</p>
<p>She stopped off at the baker’s cottage on the way. “Ebben?” she called, rapping at the door. “I need more rolls to sell.”</p>
<p>The shutters swung open from the window next to her, and the old man poked his head out. “I was hoping you would.”</p>
<p>“I probably will most days, for a little while. Mary doesn’t mind, does she?”</p>
<p>“Not a bit!” sang Mary’s voice out from within. “I’ll take as many breaks as you give me!”</p>
<p>“We’re not that old yet,” Ebben muttered, turning away. Arya stepped over to the window, listening to him grumble as he gathered up the bread into a large basket. “I don’t get a break, myself, up long before dawn to make how many—”</p>
<p>Arya grinned and leaned onto the windowsill, propping her chin in her hands. “At least you know I'll get good prices for them.”</p>
<p>“Yes, yes.” He hobbled over and shoved the full basket towards her. Wisps of steam escaped the folds of the towel tucked over the fresh rolls, and Arya hummed in appreciation as she caught a whiff.</p>
<p>She hooked her arm through the basket’s handle. “Thank you, Ebben,” she said. “I’ll see you again this evening.”</p>
<p>“Just make sure you keep those good prices up,” he called after her, above his wife’s gentle laughter.</p>
<p>Arya walked her horse the rest of the way, unwilling to risk upending Ebben’s rolls all over the road, and tethered him away out of sight of the gates. Carefully, she pushed the rolls aside and filled the bottom of her basket with the purses of tax money. She covered them back up, making sure they weren't visible and didn't jingle when she moved, then turned her steps towards Nottingham.</p>
<p>Inside the gates, she carried herself differently. Her chin was high, she slowed her gait, and she shouted easily above the noise of the townspeople, calling out for them to buy her rolls, warm fresh rolls, only a few pennies each, come and get them!</p>
<p>She sold her way through town towards the castle, not lingering too long in any one street. By the time she reached the bottom of Castle Rock, the hill atop which the castle sat like a stone crown, she still had most of her rolls left to sell. She began selling her way up and down the street that ran along the bottom of the hill, keeping an eye on the gates for a familiar tall head. </p>
<p>He may not come out into town, again, she knew. The old sheriff never had, but then she already knew that his behavior would be no model for this new sheriff’s. And this mission of hers to learn about him would last several days, at least. But she was not about to waste the first one. If she had a chance to talk to him, she would take it.</p>
<p>The sun inched higher, the morning chill dissipated from the air, and Arya’s basket grew lighter and lighter. Arya began to wonder if there were any way to get inside the castle grounds, perhaps under the guise of wanting to sell to the guards or castle servants.</p>
<p>The idea didn’t seem likely, but another one occurred to her as she watched the gates. Her basket was light on her arm; she’d have to do it now, before she ran out of bread. </p>
<p>She sauntered up to one of the guards next to the gate tower. He faced dutifully ahead, but his eyes followed her basket sidelong. She smiled and held a roll out towards him. “A roll, ser?” </p>
<p>“Please,” he said at once. His companion, on the other side of the gate, scowled at him. </p>
<p>“And you, ser?” She offered a roll to the far guard.</p>
<p>He turned away. “Thank you, miss, but we can’t be distracted. Don’t want to piss off the new sheriff—you know the way of it.”</p>
<p>“Is he so short-tempered?” she asked, wide-eyed.</p>
<p>“I dunno yet, miss,” said the guard. “Haven’t had time to find out. But I’d like to put it off as long as I can.”</p>
<p>“He’s barely been around long enough to even see him,” said the first guard through a mouthful of roll, passing Arya the coins he owed her. “Spent the whole first day wandering around the town. Went out last night too. Didn’t get back ‘til dawn.”</p>
<p>“What did he wander around town for?”</p>
<p>Both of them shrugged. “Not a clue,” said the far guard.</p>
<p>Arya excused herself and drifted off to sell the last of her rolls. Hours of waiting around, and she’d learned nothing except that he had spent time out and about in Nottingham. </p>
<p>Her quest to learn about the sheriff hadn’t been too fruitful, but she had another task to fulfill while she was in town. She ducked into the alley behind the alehouse and pulled the towel out of her empty basket, wrapping it over her hair. As she stepped back out into the street, she ducked her head, hunched her shoulders, and held her basket close in front of her, like a woman beaten down by the world, a woman whom nobody wanted to look at for too long. </p>
<p>She slipped in and out of shops and alleys, looking just pitiful enough that most people avoided eye contact with her. Whenever she had the chance, she slipped a purse into a tradesperson’s window or behind a shop counter. By now, most of the locals recognized the purses, knew who they were from. </p>
<p>She wondered if she should ask any of them if they had seen the sheriff the day before, to find out what he’d been doing, but decided against it. For some reason she couldn’t quite put a finger on, she didn’t want to learn about him by hearsay only; she wanted to be face-to-face with him, wanted to see him for herself. </p>
<p>When at last her basket was empty, she set off for Ebben’s house to return it. <em>I’ll be back</em>, she thought, looking over her shoulder at the town gates receding behind her. <em>Tomorrow, I will find him. </em></p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Gendry ate supper in the guards’ mess hall, a little apart from the other men, too tired to try to speak to them. He had been up all night seeing the unfortunate tax wagon to Mansfield and back, and had spent all day pouring over the old sheriff’s records, searching for any clues about the bandits and their leader. It had turned out to be a wasted effort; the old sheriff had seemed concerned with little but the finances of his own castle, and of his wine cellar particularly. </p>
<p> So despite the racket of conversation around him, Gendry did nothing but stare silently into his ale. He kept going over what he knew about the bandit leader, as though repeating it would make the list grow longer. </p>
<p><em>Slight figure. Good with sword and bow. Wolfskin hood. Slight figure. Good with sword and bow. Wolfskin hood.</em> He looked around at the guards eating around him. <em>I suppose it would be useless to ask any of them if they know someone with a wolfskin hood,</em> he thought wryly. It wasn’t a common garment, and would surely be a dead giveaway as to what he was really asking. And every man in this room should be good with a sword and a bow, so that question was out as well.</p>
<p>He scanned them again, more closely. None of them were the right stature; there were a number of short men, and a number of slender men, but not many that were both. And even they seemed too large. <em>He’d have to be a very small man. Or a boy. Or even a woman, perhaps.</em> </p>
<p>He turned that last thought over in his mind. It wasn’t as common for a woman to have learned the bow and sword as for a man, but if the old sheriff had been looking for a man, that would certainly help explain how the bandit had escaped detection so far. </p>
<p>Hopefully they wouldn’t escape him for too long. Cersei had been growing rapidly impatient, tired of watching her gold trickle away, tired of the jokes that the court muttered about it, tired of this little thorn in her side that no one could seem to get rid of.</p>
<p>
  <em>I’ll get rid of it. And then she’ll make me a real Baratheon.</em>
</p>
<p><em>Focus, Gendry.</em> He shook his head, trying to clear it. That day would never come if he couldn’t track down the bandit in the wolfskin hood. </p>
<p>He had so little to go on, so far. He didn’t know enough about anyone who lived here—who was that size? Who would have had the opportunity to learn both archery and swordplay, outside of his own guard? And such an unusual style of swordplay, no less, all quick darting movements and fluid finesse. </p>
<p>Perhaps the children he had spoken to would tell him more. If he was honest with himself, he doubted it. They had clearly looked up to the bandits. And no one else in town had wanted to talk to him at all.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until he left the mess hall that he remembered the one person who had spoken to him. <em>The girl. The one with the basket, who joked about the bandits.</em> </p>
<p>He couldn’t help but grin. She might have joked, but she had spoken to him even knowing he was the sheriff, and about the bandits to boot. Maybe she could be convinced to talk to him more, and more seriously.</p>
<p>He returned to his chambers with something of a spring in his step, already itching to seek her out, despite the late hour. She was his best lead, and not a bad one. <em>Besides anything else,</em> he let himself think, his cheeks turning a little pink, <em>she was pretty.</em></p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya saw the sheriff almost as soon as she arrived on Castle Street the next day. He hadn’t seen her yet, even though he stood half a head taller than everyone else around him.</p>
<p>She paused at the corner for a moment to watch him. It was still early, and the street wasn’t too busy. The sheriff stood awkwardly to the side of it, glancing around, fidgeting. Most of the townspeople gave him sidelong looks and a wide berth.</p>
<p>Every so often, he tried to speak to one of them. None of those conversations lasted long, and after each one, he looked more uncomfortable, the crease on his forehead growing deeper, his fidgeting increasing.</p>
<p>Finally, Arya approached him. She did so slowly, strolling along as if she weren’t paying much attention to where she was going, stopping a couple times before she reached him to sell more rolls. After her second sale, she glanced up to find the sheriff watching her. He gave her a hesitant wave.</p>
<p>She waved back. The relief on his face was clear, and he came to meet her halfway across the street.</p>
<p>“Sheriff.” She greeted him with a curtsy. “We meet again. I have rolls, this time. Would you like one?”</p>
<p>“Oh, right—er—yes, please. Thank you.” He dug in his belt pouch for the coin and passed them to her. “I don’t think I got your name last time.”</p>
<p>“It’s Nan, ser. And yours? Or should I just call you ‘Sheriff?’”</p>
<p>“No, please don’t.” He offered her his hand. “My name is Gendry.”</p>
<p>She shook it, but raised an eyebrow. “Is it alright for me to call you just by your given name?”</p>
<p>“It’s what I’d prefer.”</p>
<p>“No surname?”</p>
<p>“Gendry is fine,” he said again.</p>
<p>She wondered if there was a reason he was avoiding a surname, but it didn’t seem wise to press further. Instead, she propped her basket against her hip and asked, “Well, then how do you find Nottingham so far, Gendry?”</p>
<p>“It’s been… It’s not been what I expected.”</p>
<p>“How do you mean?”</p>
<p>His mouth opened, then shut again, and his brow furrowed. “I guess I’m not sure what I did expect. But it wasn’t this.”</p>
<p>“We’re a normal enough town.”</p>
<p>“I suppose I just don’t know enough about it yet.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Would you… that is, can I ask you about it? About Nottingham?”</p>
<p>Arya almost laughed. All day yesterday she had waited around in need of information from him, and here he was asking her for information outright. “What do you want to know?”</p>
<p>“Well… why—” He pressed his lips together, then huffed out a sigh. “Why won’t anyone tell me anything about the bandits? Don’t they want them arrested?”</p>
<p>“Why would they?”</p>
<p>“Because they’re… bandits.”</p>
<p>Arya shrugged. “They haven’t done us any harm.”</p>
<p>“They’re stealing your tax money. And the queen is just going to keep raising your taxes until it stops. That’s hurting you, isn’t it?”</p>
<p><em>He doesn’t know what we do with it.</em> “The more taxes she takes, the more the bandits will have to steal. Cersei can raise them all she wants—it won’t make a difference to them.”</p>
<p>The usual rush of wrath filled her as the queen’s name passed her lips. She shoved it down. Now wasn’t the time. And besides, Nan didn’t have all the reasons to hate Cersei that Arya did. Nan needed to focus on the conversation at hand.</p>
<p>Gendry was shaking his head. “She’s not going to stop,” he said earnestly. “She can’t, I don’t think, or she’ll look weak, and she’d never let herself do that. She’s just going to keep coming down harder and harder.”</p>
<p>Arya’s hand tightened on the handle of her basket. This was not how she had intended this conversation to go. She didn’t want to talk about Cersei Lannister—she needed to learn about Sheriff Gendry. “Do you know her well, then?”</p>
<p>Something in his face shuttered. “Well enough.”</p>
<p><em>Aha. </em>“How well is that?”</p>
<p>Gendry squinted up at the sky. “Er—it’s later than I realized. I have to go, I have… work to do.” He began to step away, then turned back. “Will you be here tomorrow?”</p>
<p>Arya would be here every day until she understood what she and her companions were dealing with. “Probably.”</p>
<p>“Then I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said, and was gone.</p>
<p>Arya watched until he disappeared into the gate tower. Yes, she would be at the same place tomorrow, and she would be more prepared.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>“How do you know the queen, again? I don’t think you said yesterday.”</p>
<p>Arya might have been more prepared this morning, but Gendry was too. “Oh you know,” he said easily, examining the roll in his hands a bit too closely, “growing up in London, everyone gossips about the nobles, especially the king and queen. I can tell you about Robert, too. Just from the rumors.”</p>
<p>“Like what? Tell me.”</p>
<p>“He liked wine, and women.”</p>
<p>“Everyone knows that. You don’t have to have lived in the capital.”</p>
<p>“But we also knew what taverns he liked best, and which of the kids in the back rooms were probably his.”</p>
<p>That was interesting, but not what Arya was looking for. “So you lived in the city proper? Not the palace?” When he nodded, she asked, “How did you come to be sheriff, then?”</p>
<p>“Oh—that’s a long story. I’d hate to bore—”</p>
<p>“It’s okay, I’d like to hear—”</p>
<p>“But you have rolls to sell, surely you can’t waste your time—”</p>
<p>“Just come with me, then, as I sell them.”</p>
<p>A bit of pink touched his cheeks. “Oh—right. Okay. Yeah, I’ll come.”</p>
<p>There was something familiar about his eyes, about their particular shade of blue, but Arya couldn’t quite place it. “I don’t mean to pry, you know,” she said as she wove down the street, feeling him follow at her back. “It’s just a bit unusual, to have a sheriff who’s not a noble. Not that I’m complaining.”</p>
<p>“How do you know I’m not a noble?”</p>
<p>“You’re from London, but not from the palace. Wherever you lived, you talked to plenty of smallfolk, which isn’t common for the nobility. And you don’t have a surname.”</p>
<p>“I do have one.”</p>
<p>“Then it’s even stranger for you not to mention it. Usually nobles are proud of their surnames.”</p>
<p>He snorted. “Well, you’re right, anyway. I’m no noble.”</p>
<p>She watched him carefully from the corner of her eye. “You sure you don’t want to tell me the story? I’m all ears.”</p>
<p>“It’s not much of a story. Really,” he said, looking down. “Just a bit of luck, I suppose.”</p>
<p>Arya wasn’t fool enough to believe that he was appointed sheriff by pure luck, but she didn’t think that pressing further would convince him to answer her. There was something familiar to the stubborn twist of his mouth, something she had seen in Jon and Sansa and even in the mirror. She cast about for another question, something to distract him for now.</p>
<p>He spoke before she could find one. “What about you? You said the other day that you were friends with the bandits.” He grinned. “How does a nice girl like you come to be friends with folks like that?”</p>
<p><em>Maybe I shouldn’t have made that particular joke.</em> “Oh, you didn’t believe that, did you? I wasn’t being serious, you know.”</p>
<p>“Are you sure?” He tucked his hands into his belt, facing determinedly ahead, trying to look like he didn’t care much about her answer. “It seems like a lot of the folk in Nottingham like the bandits. No one wants to talk to me about them.”</p>
<p>“Maybe it’s just that no one knows much about them. Besides, it’s a close-knit town, and you’re new, that’s all. I wouldn’t read too much into it.”</p>
<p>“I wish I didn’t have to, but it’s my job to read into it. It’s my job to find the bandits and bring them to the queen’s justice. Especially their leader.”</p>
<p>Arya kept her face carefully smooth. “Good luck finding him. No one has a clue who he is.”</p>
<p>“Me neither,” Gendry said with a sigh, and Arya let herself relax a little. “But I have to find out. You wouldn’t happen to know anyone who wears wolfskin, would you?”</p>
<p><em>It’s not you. You’re Nan, not Arya.</em> “Wolfskin? No. That’s a strange thing to wear.”</p>
<p>He sighed again. “It is, but the bandit leader's hood was wolfskin. I’m hoping maybe that could help me track him down.”</p>
<p>“Should you be telling me this?”</p>
<p>He started. “What?”</p>
<p>“This sounds like official business,” she said, a bit of a smirk crossing her face. “Should you be telling any old merchant girl about this?”</p>
<p>“Oh—I—well, you’re the only one who’d talk to me,” he muttered, flushing a little. “I wouldn’t if I didn’t have to.”</p>
<p>“Why don’t you just make them talk to you? You’re the sheriff, after all.”</p>
<p>“How would I make them talk to me?”</p>
<p>“Oh, you know.” Arya kept her tone light but watched him closely. “The old sheriff quite liked the pillory.”</p>
<p>He stopped in his tracks. “You think I would—just to make someone talk to—”</p>
<p>“How would I know?” she said. “You haven’t been here long enough for me to learn, one way or the other. So you wouldn’t, then? Why not?”</p>
<p>“What do you—I—” He sputtered for a moment, his faint blush from earlier turning to an angry red. “Because I’m not—I won’t. That’s why.”</p>
<p>“That’s not a reason,” Arya pointed out. “That’s barely even a sentence.”</p>
<p>Gendry glared at her. “I wouldn’t pillory someone over something like that, something so… small.”</p>
<p>“But I thought it was your solemn duty to track down this bandit.”</p>
<p>“I’ll find some other way to do it.” He was scowling and fidgety, shifting his weight around and clenching his fists. “Excuse me, I have to go. I’ve been away from my duties too long.” He began to stomp back towards the castle gates, but only got a few steps away before he turned back. “Will you be here tomorrow?”</p>
<p>“Where else would I be, when there are rolls to sell?”</p>
<p>He jerked his head in a nod and resumed his stormy retreat. This hadn’t been at all how he had wanted the conversation to go. He focused on breathing deep and long, like Davos had taught him, to calm down. <em>Tomorrow. It’ll go better tomorrow. </em></p>
<p>Arya had the same thought. She made quick work of selling the remaining bread and distributing a few more purses of tax money, then hurried to return to Ebben’s basket. She had another stop to make now, before it got too late.</p>
<p>She had known from the first time she donned it that the wolfskin hood was dangerous. It wasn’t a common material, and it made for a distinctive mantle. Anguy and Little Jon had both tried to talk her out of it, when she had showed up at camp with it pulled over her head. “It's too obvious,” they told her. "It'll get you caught for sure."</p>
<p>Perhaps that time was almost upon her. She knew the smart thing to do would be to get rid of it, bury it somewhere maybe, and use one of the plain woolen mantles the others wore. But before she even finished the thought, she knew she wouldn’t do that. It wasn’t even an option, really. That mantle was the only token she had of her family, and since she couldn’t have them, she had to have it.</p>
<p>The furrier slept in the tanner’s barn when he was in town, which Arya knew he had been for almost a week. She slipped through the hedge behind the barn and leaned through the doorway, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dimness within.</p>
<p>The furrier was reclining against a bale of hay, his head tilted back, his eyes closed. He appeared for all the world to be asleep, but he must have heard her approach, because as she stepped over the threshold he cracked his eyes open. “What?”</p>
<p>She stepped closer. “Do you remember me?”</p>
<p>“Yes. Wanted a wolfskin.”</p>
<p>“I need to ask something else of you.”</p>
<p>He sat up. “What else? Do you have the coin for it?”</p>
<p>“It’s more of a favor.”</p>
<p>“I don’t deal in favors. Just coin.”</p>
<p>“You’re a northerner. I know your accent.”</p>
<p>“Aye, yours is the same. What of it?”</p>
<p>“I need you to forget about the wolfskin. And about me.”</p>
<p>He extended a gnarled hand. “As I said, I’ll need coin.”</p>
<p>She didn’t trust payment in coin enough for this. “Would you do it for loyalty? To the north? To the Starks?”</p>
<p>His face went carefully blank. “The Starks are dead.”</p>
<p>“Not all of them.” <em>Just Father, and Robb, and Rickon, and probably Bran. Lost to Cersei’s war in the south, in some hot place far from home.</em> “There’s Sansa Stark, in Leeds.”</p>
<p>“What does the Stark girl in Leeds have to do with you wanting me to forget about the wolfskin?”</p>
<p>“Nothing, just—the new sheriff may come asking about it, soon. If you’re still in town, would you keep this secret? For the sake of the Starks?”</p>
<p>He examined her face, his eyes narrow and calculating. She saw the suspicion occur to him just for an instant, and then he scowled. “Fine,” he said. Despite his expression, his voice wasn’t as harsh now as it had been. “From one northerner to another, fine. I don’t suppose you’ll tell me anything more about it?”</p>
<p>“Better for you not to know.” She gave him a small smile. “But you have the gratitude of the Starks.”</p>
<p>She turned to leave, but the sound of his voice stopped her at the door. “I wondered if it had something to do with the Starks, when you asked for it in the first place.”</p>
<p>She wanted to answer him. She wanted to tell him her name, to prove the suspicion she’d seen in his eyes, to claim her surname for the first time in almost a year. After all, she was a noble, and she was proud of it. But more than that, she wanted to feel like a part of her own family again.</p>
<p>But they were gone, all of them either in the ground or scattered to the winds. And she had a duty to carry out, for their sakes. She left without another word.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Gendry’s life settled into a rhythm. Get up; see to the day’s paperwork and orders and the other banalities of being sheriff; go try to find Nan in the marketplace, and chat with her for an hour or two if she was there; and once a week, ride along with the tax wagon that passed through Sherwood Forest. He told himself that this was in an effort to capture the bandit leader, but he had to admit that this seemed less and less likely, as they outclassed him every time they crossed paths.</p>
<p>He began to think that they knew who he was; they seemed always to single him out, to face him specifically. If he were honest with himself, he would soon have had to admit that he admired them.</p>
<p>Indeed, this bandit was a wonder. One night, just as Gendry thought they were on the point of sending the bandits off empty-handed, the leader rolled under him—right between his legs—and shot the traces that connected the horses' harness to the wagon. They stamped and tossed their heads, already on edge from the fighting, and before Gendry could grab the bandit, they had slapped the nearest horse on the rump. She shot forward, her pair following gladly, pulling straight out of the wagon shafts to gallop away down the road.</p>
<p>The driver tried to hold on to the reins, but instead was pulled from the wagon himself, landing hard in the dirt with a grunt. “Catch them!” he shrieked, scrambling to his feet. “Catch them, before they get too far off!”</p>
<p>A number of Gendry’s guards began to run after the horses, despite his cries to stay focused on the bandits. When he turned, the bandit leader was disappearing into the trees, closely following another thief whose arms were full of sacks of tax money.</p>
<p>Another time, when one of the guardsmen threw at knife at them, the bandit leader shot it straight out of midair, and another time, they shot straight through Gendry’s hat, letting the rain leak through onto his hair.</p>
<p>It was around this time that Gendry began to take his task more personally. This wolfskin bandit was mocking him, and he did not appreciate it.</p>
<p>He took to venting sometimes to Nan, but found that this didn’t provide as much relief as he had hoped. She found the hat story in particular very amusing, leaving him grumpier than before.</p>
<p>Still, he looked forward to seeing her. She still hadn’t told him anything of material use in tracking down the bandit’s identity, but she had agreed to introduce him to some of the locals. He’d hoped that this would make them warm up to him, if they saw he was friends with Nan. After all, they seemed very willing to chat with her. And they did become more cordial after Nan introduced them, but more often than not, he still found himself standing bored to the side while Nan and the shopkeepers chatted about the latest news—a battle lost in Morocco against the Dragon Queen, a handsome new foal born to some farmer or other, some minor noble called Clegane had killed his older brother. None of the gossip ever had anything to do with the bandits, and even though some of the townspeople were willing to speak to Gendry now, they still closed off when he asked about the bandits.</p>
<p>Nan only smiled when he told her this. “You’ve only been here—what, a month? Six weeks? You’re still new to them.”</p>
<p>“That can’t be the only reason,” he grumbled, kicking at a pebble in the road. “I’ve been out here every day talking to them, trying to stop being new. Why isn’t it working? You’re sure there’s no other reason they won’t talk to me about it?”</p>
<p>“No, of course not,” she assured him, but her smile glinted sharp again, like the first day they’d met.</p>
<p>“I don’t believe you.”</p>
<p>She stopped to sell a roll to an older man passing by. “Maybe they just don’t like you,” she said, tucking his payment into her belt.</p>
<p>The thought wounded him. “Why not?”</p>
<p>“You’re not like them. They struggle to get by, and you live up there above them in the castle—”</p>
<p>“I came up as poor as any of them,” he snapped. “It was pure luck that put me there, nothing else.”</p>
<p>Nan stopped and searched his face, her grey eyes unreadable. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to offend you.”</p>
<p>“You didn’t.” He knew the lie was obvious, but he wasn't in the mood to explain any of it—not his upbringing in the slums, his mother’s death, his father catching sight of him one day in the forge and recognizing the lines of his own face in Gendry’s. He still hadn’t told her his surname.</p>
<p>He almost didn’t want to go back out and find Nan the next morning, still upset about it. But the alternative was staying in to read reports about the state of the guardsmen’s barracks, or to pass judgment on a few pickpockets. He had quickly found that to be the worst of his duties as sheriff; he had no desire to sentence a lashing or a day in the pillory for such minor crimes, no matter what the law said. He left orders for them to simply be held in the dungeon for the night, and went out looking for Nan’s brown braid and sharp smile.</p>
<p>He could not escape his job even with her, though—not that day. He had been talking with Nan about the folks that lived around the village, in the cabins and farms dotted through the surrounding countryside, when a shout and a crash cut off her response. She was moving before he could react, slipping through the crowd as easily as water through rocks. Large as he was, Gendry couldn’t get through as fast, but he followed as quick as he could. He stretched onto his tiptoes, trying to get a look at what he would be dealing with.</p>
<p>A farmer knelt by her upended cart, trying to salvage the fruit strewn into the dirt. Next to her, a guardsman gripped the wrist of a small, scrawny girl wearing a sackcloth tunic and a sour expression.</p>
<p>The guard yanked on her arm, lifting her near off her feet. “Thought you’d help yourself, did you?” he was saying, his voice harsh. “That’s a day in the pillory for you, you little—”</p>
<p>A roll flew through the air, hitting the guard in the eye. He reeled back. “What—”</p>
<p>“Let her go,” Nan’s voice snarled.</p>
<p>Despite himself, Gendry felt a laugh bubbling up his throat. He covered his mouth to stifle it. <em>She’s got good aim.</em></p>
<p>“You’ve just assaulted a guardsman.” The guard stepped towards Nan, dragging the little girl along behind.</p>
<p>"What, you've been hurt by a bread roll?" Nan sneered. A few of the spectators snickered.</p>
<p>“You—”</p>
<p>Gendry pushed his way through the last of the spectators. “That’s enough,” he called, and the guard pulled up short.</p>
<p>“Sheriff, ser—I was just apprehending this thief, and—”</p>
<p>Nan whirled on Gendry. “Let her go. Give him the order.”</p>
<p>The guards started forward again. “Now, wait just a minute—”</p>
<p>Gendry held up a hand, and the man stopped. “What did the girl do?”</p>
<p>“Does it matter? She’s a child,” Nan snapped.</p>
<p>"She was trying to steal this." The guard held out a pear. The little girl’s eyes followed it hungrily.</p>
<p>Gendry reached for the girl’s arm. “I’ll take her,” he told the guard. “You may return to your duties.”</p>
<p>The guard looked as though he wanted to argue, but thought better of it and closed his mouth. He passed the girl’s wrist into Gendry’s gentler grip, sketched him a bow, and headed back up the street. The spectators dispersed as well, murmuring to each other and eyeing Gendry and the girl curiously.</p>
<p>Nan planted herself in front of him. “What are you going to do with her?”</p>
<p>Gendry looked down. The girl glared right back up at him, her jaw set. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “Maybe the cook at the castle needs another scullery girl. She would sleep there, and we’d feed her.”</p>
<p>Nan narrowed her eyes. “Do you mean to work her as punishment?”</p>
<p>“No, of course not! I’m just—” He looked around, then leaned down closer to her and lowered his voice. “If we take her on, she’ll have food in her belly and a roof over her head. And then this won’t happen to her again.”</p>
<p>Nan glared at him for another heartbeat, then looked down at the girl. “What’s your name?” she asked. The girl just shook her head. “Alright,” Nan tried again. “Then just tell me—are you okay with this? With going to work in the castle for him?” She gestured up at Gendry.</p>
<p>The little girl looked between them, her expression still stony. Then, slowly, she nodded.</p>
<p>Nan stepped back. “Alright, then.”</p>
<p>An awkward silence stretched between them until Gendry cleared his throat. “I need to see if the farmer is alright,” he said, “and take this little one home. I’ll see you tomorrow?”</p>
<p>Nan nodded, not quite looking at him. Gendry tried to ignore the sinking feeling in his chest as he turned toward the farmer—but then he felt Nan’s hand on his arm.</p>
<p>“Thank you, Gendry,” she said quietly, if a bit grudgingly.</p>
<p>He nodded. She went back to selling her rolls, and he knelt by the farmer’s side to see if she needed help or restitution. The little girl helped them pick up the fruit, and when she thought Gendry wasn’t looking, the farmer passed her a new pear.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya took care, each week at the tax wagon, to make sure her scarf and hood were fastened securely. She knew that talking so much to Gendry was a risk, that he’d recognize her the instant her scarf or hood slipped. She wasn’t sure what she would do, if that happened, so she did what to she could to ensure that it wouldn't.</p>
<p>Even without him seeing her face, she found herself slipping a little to close to discovery. One night, Little Jon got himself into a spot of trouble with a guard even taller than he was. Arya ran out to his aid and caught a guard's spearpoint deep in her leg. She stabbed him right back with Needle, and she and Little Jon got themselves away into the woods.</p>
<p>The next day in town, she struggled to hide her limp. Gendry noticed and asked if she was alright.</p>
<p>She smiled at him, trying to make it look normal rather than pinched with pain. “I’m fine,” she said, but she must not have been entirely believable, because the next thing she knew he was offering her his arm to lean on.</p>
<p>She eyed it for a second, half-hoping she could just wish the pain away instead. Then she took it, grumbling her thanks. For the rest of the morning, she found herself unable to focus on their conversation, and as she hobbled back to her horse later with her empty basket, she found her temper rising, because damn if she wasn’t starting to like the sheriff.</p>
<p>She didn’t want to like him. He was by necessity her enemy, and nothing was going to change that except her giving up or him finding a new job. Neither was likely.</p>
<p>Still—even after all this time, he hadn’t proved himself to be cruel or ambitious or greedy, or any of the other things that Arya associated with Cersei and her ilk. Instead, he was kind, if sometimes grumpy, and friendly, if sometimes stubborn. And even as sheriff, as far as Arya knew, the only occupant the pillory had seen since he’d arrived had been a shopkeeper caught beating his son.</p>
<p>Indeed, Arya began to wish Gendry had never come to Nottingham. She wished their new sheriff had been the Lannister lackey she’d expected, not a man Arya wanted to be friends with.</p>
<p>When she wasn’t in town as Nan, Arya holed up in camp, working on a plan to kidnap Prince Joffrey. Information had been hard to come by, they had gathered it in hints and trickles, until they had a picture. He would be passing through Sherwood in a month’s time on his way to the Tully estate in Leeds, and would stop overnight in Nottingham on the way. On his way back, the word was that he would have a lady companion. Arya snapped the pencil she was holding when Lem came back with that particular bit of news.</p>
<p>Arya and her companions spent hours pouring over maps of the woods, hashing out the best and worst places to strike, the best places to stash him, the best routes to and from. She found herself dreaming of their rough-drawn forest maps.</p>
<p>She also dreamed of her sister. It had been close to a year since she’d last seen her, and Arya since then had kept her focus on the task at hand—robbing every bit of Cersei Lannister’s precious gold that she possibly could.</p>
<p>And as much as Arya missed her family, she knew that for now, it was safer to stay away. Joffrey might be on his way to Sansa, but she had passed most of a year without any attention from the Lannisters. Arya returning would have likely brought that attention sooner.</p>
<p>After all, Sansa probably did think Arya was dead. What else could she think, when Arya failed to show up where they'd promised to meet? And hadn't come to find her in all the months since?</p>
<p>She thought she saw her once, though, in a carriage passing through Nottingham. Arya had been in the middle of distributing coin purses and had almost missed her, but caught the flash of her auburn hair through the carriage window. Heart pounding, she had cut through an alley to see the carriage better as it passed the next street, and glimpsed the Tully coat of arms painted on the carriage door. Arya slept away from the other bandits that night, far enough that she could let a few tears fall without fear of their being seen.</p>
<p>As they planned to intercept Joffrey, she wondered if she should try to get word to Sansa that he was coming for her. The Tullys probably knew he was coming to their estate—the Lannisters could be safely relied upon to inform their hosts of their arrival ahead of time, so they could be received with all the pomp and luxury that they considered their due—but did Sansa know that he was coming because of her?</p>
<p>Once or twice, Arya started to write her a letter, only to rip the paper into shreds a few lines in and let them drift away on the wind. How could she start such a letter? <em>Hello, Sansa. Long time, no see. Sorry I let you think I was dead.</em></p>
<p>Her visits to town, and her conversations with Gendry, became a welcome distraction. She told herself this was so that she could find out more about him—hopefully something terrible that would remind her, even to the depths of her heart, that he truly was her enemy, so maybe she wouldn't be starting to feel bad for lying to him.</p>
<p>He never did or said anything of the sort--quite the opposite. One morning, he met her in the market with a flower. She stopped in her tracks, staring at it as if it were a snake in her path. “What’s that for?”</p>
<p>He shrugged, his cheeks turning pink. “It just seemed like a nice thing to do.”</p>
<p>Arya took the flower and stuck it in her hair, but pretended to be grumpy about it.</p>
<p>Sometimes the other bandits would ask her about Gendry, especially as they worked on their kidnapping plans. He came along so often to help protect the tax money, they figured that surely he would come along to protect the crown prince as well. They asked her about what kind of man he was, what he feared, how he trained, what he thought of this and that, what she thought he might do in this situation or other.</p>
<p>Arya answered as best she could, trying to avoid sounding like she might think of him as a friend, or like she might think of him well at all. After a few barely coherent answers, she began to notice the others exchanging certain looks. “What?” she demanded.</p>
<p>“Maybe we should have sent someone else to go scout him out,” Anguy said with a grin.</p>
<p>“What’s that supposed to mean?”</p>
<p>Lem began to sing, an old song about a lad and a lass in the forest.</p>
<p>As soon as she recognized the tune, Arya’s face burned bright red. “Stop that.”</p>
<p>Lem only sang louder, and Arya kicked one of his knees out from under him. He toppled to the ground, sending the breath right out of him in a huff. He only laughed though, along with the others. Arya stormed off, wondering why she had ever allied herself with them in the first place.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Gendry began to wonder why he was really meeting with Nan in the market. She was awfully quick-witted, and it had been quite a while since he’d managed to get her to even mention the bandits. Indeed, he kept forgetting to try. And if he were honest with himself, he knew that he no longer expected to—but still he went to meet her.</p>
<p>He knew for sure that he was only went out to see her, to spend time with her, after she showed up one day in a green embroidered dress, cut to a more flattering fit than the working clothes she usually wore. His face grew warm as she came up to him, despite her glare.</p>
<p>“You look nice,” he told her when she reached him.</p>
<p>She looked away, muttering under her breath. Gendry caught “bastards stole my clothes” and nothing else. He wondered who she was talking about.</p>
<p>“Really,” he said. “You look like you’re on your way to a noble dinner.”</p>
<p>She gave an ignoble snort. “I look ridiculous.”</p>
<p>“You really don’t.”</p>
<p>“Besides, nobles don’t wear things like this. Market girls don’t either,” she added sourly, “but a noble girl still wouldn’t be caught dead in this.”</p>
<p>“What do you mean?”</p>
<p>She picked at the skirt. “The embroidery is sloppy. It looks like I did it, for heaven’s sake. And the wool is too coarse for a noble.”</p>
<p>“And how does a market girl know what a noble girl would or wouldn’t want in a dress?”</p>
<p>For once, it was Nan who turned pink. “Don’t worry about it,” she snapped.</p>
<p>Gendry almost felt like he had the upper hand, but then he looked down at her flashing steely eyes and that pretty dress. His heart flipped over.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until hours later that he really began to wonder how Nan knew what a noble girl would think. He wasn’t sure where she would have ever met one. He tried to convince himself to work out some way to get more information out of her about it, but his heart wasn't in it. </p>
<p>
  <em>I may need to find some other way to find out more about the bandit with the wolf’s hood. I may be a little too distracted here.</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I've lowkey forgotten about author's notes, whoops</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for your comments! I read and appreciate them all, even if I hadn't had a lot of time to answer them ;u; the entire story is finished, so I'm busy working on revising it by Thursday, which is when the last chapter will be up, for the 2020 Gendrya BigBang.</p>
<p>Hope y'all enjoyed this chapter! The next one will be up a little later today</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>One morning, Gendry came down to breakfast to find a royal missive waiting for him where he usually sat. He hesitated at the sight of it, imagining the red lion seal to be snarling at him, as if it would bite his hand when he picked it up. It was a childish thought and he shook it away, chiding himself for entertaining it, but still felt a moment of dread as he broke the seal and read the letter’s contents.</p>
<p>None of it was good news. The queen was getting impatient, and the prince was coming to Nottingham. Gendry wondered if Joffrey’s stop here was Cersei’s punishment for taking so long in tracking down the bandit. Perhaps she thought it would spur him into action, and he could catch them in time to present them to Joffrey in shackles, like some kind of trophy.</p>
<p>The closest thing he had to a lead since giving up on getting any information out of Nan was the name of a furrier who was reported to have traded in wolfskin recently, a northern man who passed through Nottingham a few times a year. Unfortunately, he had left town soon after Gendry had arrived.</p>
<p>Gendry checked the letter again and groaned aloud. He had only two days until the prince arrived. There was so much to do—prepare his rooms, plan his meals, ready himself to put up with being around him. He could already hear Joffrey’s sneers, about how this was all one could expect of a bastard, about how stupid he was, about what he would do to the bandit once he caught him. Just the thought almost set Gendry’s blood to boiling, and he took a moment just to breathe, to listen to the early-morning quiet.</p>
<p>Calmed, he opened his eyes, scarfed down his breakfast, and went to begin preparations for the royal visit.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya’s preparations were complete. Her companions knew the plan inside and out. Their weapons had been sharpened and mended, their arrows replenished. Little Jon had built a sturdy shack deep in the woods where they could keep Joffrey until their ransom was met.</p>
<p>With nothing left to get ready, and an entire day left to wait through, Arya found herself feeling jittery, on edge. She half-wished she was in town, talking to Gendry—at least she would have something to think about. But if she went, she worried that she might let slip something about their plan, and that risk could not be borne.</p>
<p>Instead, she spent the last day shooting targets and sparring with the others, leaving several bruises in her wake.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Joffrey arrived with all the pomp and empty ceremony Gendry had expected. When Gendry bowed before him, Joffrey only smirked and sniffed, as if to clear his nose of an unpleasant smell, and almost before Gendry finished greeting him, he had already pushed past him towards the castle doors, issuing orders to prepare his quarters and his dinner.</p>
<p>Gendry clenched his jaw. He had ordered those things long done before the prince arrived, and the servants now stood uncertain, exchanging confused glances. Fortunately, Joffrey did not deign to look at them, and passed into the castle and out of sight.</p>
<p>With a sigh, Gendry followed. Joffrey might be a jackass, but he was Gendry’s prince, and his half-brother. He would be patient with him—or he would at least try.</p>
<p>Joffrey did not wait long to bring up the bandit of the wolf’s hood. “So where’s this thief everyone’s talking about?” he asked over dinner, examining the piece of mutton on the end of his fork as if he thought it would sprout maggots. “I thought you were sent here to arrest him?”</p>
<p>“It’s a work in progress, Your Highness.”</p>
<p>“How long will it be in progress? My mother is losing money every day you fail to bring him in. Do you think my mother enjoys losing money?”</p>
<p>“No, Your Highness.”</p>
<p>“Do you think she’ll legitimize you if you keep losing her money?”</p>
<p>“No, Your Highness.”</p>
<p>“Then why haven’t you found him yet?”</p>
<p>Gendry took a long draught of his ale, wishing it was stronger.</p>
<p>“I told her it was a waste of time, sending you. I told her it was wrong to expect anything out of you, being a—” He looked Gendry up and down, sneering. “—well, you know.”</p>
<p><em>A lowborn bastard.</em> Gendry had suffered Joffrey’s insults for years now. Still, his grip on his mug tightened.</p>
<p>It was a long dinner, and at its end Gendry felt that he should have been congratulated for getting through it without throttling the prince. “You’ll accompany me through Sherwood to Leeds in the morning,” Joffrey informed him as he left, without need, as Gendry had aready planned on doing so. “Maybe you’ll redeem yourself and capture that bandit. I hope you do. I can’t wait to mount his head above the city gates.”</p>
<p>Joffrey’s smirk, however, said that he did not believe Gendry would do any such thing. Gendry pressed his lips together and bowed as his prince left the room, unable to force any polite adieus from his throat.</p>
<p>As soon as Joffrey was gone, Gendry slumped back into his seat and downed the rest of his ale. He hoped the bandit would show up as they passed through Sherwood, too. Maybe they’d take care of Joffrey, and Gendry wouldn’t have to deal with him anymore.</p>
<p><em>That’s a bad joke, no matter how much you hate him.</em> Whatever else Joffrey was, he was Gendry’s half-brother. He should not wish for his death. And besides, in all of their attacks, the bandits hadn’t killed anyone. Not yet, anyway.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya and her companions made for the road, making so little sound as they passed through the forest that they may as well have been nothing but a breeze. Arya couldn’t help but puff her chest out a bit, proud of their skill.</p>
<p>The night had come. Everyone had the plan memorized, knew it better than they knew their own names. Arya had made sure of it. Now they had only to carry it out.</p>
<p>In pairs and small groups, they began to separate, ranging to their appointed positions. The plan was simple enough: Draw off the guards. Separate the prince. Subdue him and bring him to his cell.</p>
<p>Arya took her own position, letting herself melt into the grey dimness of the early morning, as she knew the others were doing as well. Little Jon was nearest to her, only a few yards to her left, but if she hadn’t already known that, she’d have had no idea anyone was there.</p>
<p>Her men were good at what they did. This could work. This would work.</p>
<p>They did not have to wait long. A series of whooping hoots, like a tawny owl, sounded through the trees. Arya leaned forward, watching the road. Sure enough, a pair of riders appeared, scouting ahead of the carriage. Motionless, Arya watched them go, ignoring the tickle of dew seeping down her neck, fallen from the foliage above. They passed out of her sight unmolested and unaware of any watchers. Farther up the road, however, Lommy and a few others waited, ready to ambush them and keep them too busy to turn back to aid the prince.</p>
<p>Only a moment after they were gone, the carriage appeared. Arya couldn’t help her sharp intake of breath, even if she chastised herself immediately for the noise.</p>
<p>Joffrey was there. He was right there, and if they caught him, surely Cersei would do whatever she had to—pay whatever she had to—to get him back. Even if she had to part with heaps of her precious gold. Heaps that would more than save the people of Nottingham from any number of punitive tax hikes.</p>
<p>One guard sat atop the carriage with the driver and four more rode at its back, scanning the woods alongside the road. Joffrey would be inside.</p>
<p>One last hoot rang through the trees as the carriage drew closer. A feral smile spread across Arya’s face. It was time.</p>
<p>An arrow sailed from the trees, striking one of the guards in the arm. He grunted and twisted away from the impact, almost rolling straight off of his horse. The others turned to see what the matter was, and Anguy led several of the bandits out into the road before them, cutting them off from the carriage.</p>
<p>The guard sitting with the driver turned at the commotion and let out a shout, but Little Jon was running out now. He seized the guard and the driver and yanked them from the carriage, leaving them dazed on the dirt. He leapt up to the seat and cracked the reins. Snorting, the horses jolted forward, putting more distance between Joffrey and his guards.</p>
<p>Arya and the remaining bandits surged foward, running up alongside the carriage. Arya jumped for its side, clinging tight to the top edge, balanced precariously on the rail on the very tips of her toes. Breathless, she yanked the door open and reached in to grab Joffrey—but another hand reached out, shoving her back to the road.</p>
<p>She landed on her feet but stumbled, swearing under her breath. “What in the hell—”</p>
<p>When she looked up, the carriage door was still open, and the sheriff leaned out, one hand on his sword. Arya’s stomach dropped, and she swore some more. She could hear him shouting at Joffrey, but before she could make out the words, she heard another shout behind her—"Look out!"</p>
<p>She dove for the treeline just in time. A pair of the rear guards had broken free of the bandits and were galloping for the carriage, swords drawn. One of them swung low as he passed Arya, his blade passing through where her chest had been just an instant before. The other leaned low over his horse, charging at Little Jon, who had to leap off the carriage. The horses, feeling the reins pull as he jumped, veered towards the treeline and skidded to a halt just shy of crashing into it.</p>
<p>Arya gritted her teeth. If she had only tried the other door, she would have Joffrey. They could have gotten him and gotten out, like with they did with the tax raids, instead of having to fight a full-on skirmish. <em>There’s nothing for it now</em>, she thought, and ran after the carriage.</p>
<p>Inside it, Gendry was shouting at Joffrey. “This isn’t the time to worry about capturing the bandit!” he snarled, his patience gone. “They’re attacking <em>you</em>, Your Highness, and if you want to get away, you’re going to have to fight. They’re drawn the guards off, we’re outnumbered—”</p>
<p>Joffrey’s voice had gone very high-pitched. “I am not one of your common soldiers—you can’t just order me—”</p>
<p>Another hand reached through the door, bigger than the last one. Gendry barely had time to register the sight before it closed on his tunic and hauled him out of the carriage.</p>
<p>He hit the ground with a huff but rolled through the impact up to his feet, already drawing his sword. The owner of the hand turned to face him, a man even taller than he was with brown hair and a long, mournful face. Gendry had to tilt his head up to look at him, and tightened his grip on his sword.</p>
<p>Arya saw her chance. With the sheriff distracted by Little Jon, she darted to the far side of the carriage and threw the door open. Joffrey flinched away from her, his face gone red and blotchy.</p>
<p>She seized his ankle and dragged him out onto the dirt. He scrambled away from her, half-drawing his sword. “You can’t—I am your prince—”</p>
<p>She drew her own sword and leveled it at his chest. Step by step she advanced, driving him backwards into the forest. Finally he pulled himself to his feet and got his sword all the way out of the scabbard, brandishing it towards her in wild strokes that she parried easily. A wild joy filled her chest. For so long, she had wanted the Lannisters to pay, and finally she had one before her.</p>
<p>Then he began to scream. “Gendry!” he shrieked. “Gendry—come arrest this criminal! I command you! I command—”</p>
<p><em>Shit</em>. Arya lunged, slicing towards his chest. His cries turned into a yelp as he leapt backward, sliding awkwardly on the leafy forest floor.</p>
<p>They were well within the trees now. The plan had gone a bit awry, but it was still salvageable—Arya just had to drive him a bit farther in, out of earshot of the road. As long as the sheriff hadn’t heard him—</p>
<p>A pair of heavy footsteps thundered up behind her. She sidestepped, sending the sheriff skidding to a halt just past where she had been standing. He righted himself, lifted his chin, and stared down at Arya with a clear challenge in his eye.</p>
<p>She found herself intensely glad of the scarf wrapped around her face.</p>
<p>Joffrey started screeching again, less coherently now. “You—arrest him—seize—”</p>
<p>“I know,” Gendry snapped over his shoulder at him. “Shut up if you’re not going to help me.”</p>
<p>Beneath her scarf, Arya grinned, but raised her sword. She and Gendry locked eyes for a heartbeat—then they were moving, their swords clashing, beating out a savage beat.</p>
<p>Arya didn’t stand still for a second, moving, ducking, spinning. The sheriff had trouble keeping up, but his size and longer reach kept Arya from gaining the upper hand outright.</p>
<p>From above, Gendry saw only the wolfskin hood, until it seemed to him that he was fighting a wolf instead of a human. The bandit was as swift as a wolf, as agile, and Gendry saw a certain wolflike, fell glint in their grey eyes.</p>
<p>Something tugged at the back of his mind, a feeling that he was missing something. He tried to ignore it—now wasn’t the time. He couldn’t afford distractions.</p>
<p>But it wouldn’t go away. He watched the bandit twirl that narrow sword, beating his own blade away with ease. They were left-handed. And had grey eyes, like steel.</p>
<p>His heart began to pound. He looked at the wolfskin hood with new eyes, hearing Nan’s northern accent in his mind. The furrier had been a northerner too, and wolves were the emblem of the largest northern house.</p>
<p>
  <em>No. No, surely not. It can’t be.</em>
</p>
<p>He saw Nan throwing that roll at the guard. Her sure aim. Her unthinking willingness to start a fight with the guardsman.</p>
<p>All at once, he wanted both to laugh and to be sick. He had spent weeks asking her to inform on herself. No wonder she had never given anything up.</p>
<p>Lost in the realization, he let his sword droop, just barely. But Nan, sharp, clever Nan, wouldn’t miss that opportunity. She struck, the tip of her sword slicing into his hand, up the back of his thumb to his wrist. He hissed, flinching away, and she seized the chance to drive forward, her thin sword flashing towards him—strike after strike after strike—so fast all he could do was stagger back, trying to get back out of her reach. Under her wolf hood, her grey eyes gleamed triumphant.</p>
<p>“Wait—” he gasped, not sure what he wanted her to wait for.</p>
<p>Her eyes locked on his and narrowed, and for a moment, his entire world narrowed too. Her eyes and her sword were all that existed.</p>
<p>Joffrey’s voice broke the spell, still high-pitched and frantic. “Guards—get that horrible criminal—”</p>
<p>Nan wheeled back and sprinted for the prince. Two of Gendry’s guardsmen, looking rather the worse for wear after dealing with Nan’s bandits, planted themselves in front of Joffrey, their swords held before them in shaking, exhausted hands.</p>
<p>Gendry lunged, flying onto the forest floor to snag Nan’s ankle. She crashed to the ground with a snarl, her sword lashing back at him. He took a slice across the jaw, but shouted to his guards, “Get the prince out of here!”</p>
<p>The guards obeyed, each grabbing Joffrey by an arm. He howled and protested as they hauled him away back towards the road, but Gendry didn’t hear anything he said. Nan was back on her feet already, and it was all he could do keep her from running after Joffrey again.</p>
<p>Their swords clashed again, Gendry trying to track her agile footwork to keep her from getting around him. She let out a low snarl, trying to push her way through, but he caught his hilt on hers and shoved. Small as she was, she went stumbling backwards, then caught her heel on a root and fell.</p>
<p>Gendry knew that he should press this advantage. Here he had her—the bandit in the wolf’s hood, the one who could buy him his future, his name, his family, at last—but he found himself lowering his sword. His arm ached, and he struggled to catch his breath, and he found that the last thing he wanted to do was keep fighting her.</p>
<p>The words left his mouth before he quite realized what he was saying. “Just go. He’s gone. Just leave.”</p>
<p>Her eyes narrowed, and Gendry could well imagine the furious scowl she wore beneath that scarf. He hoped she would listen to him nonetheless. He hoped that he could keep her from skewering him, if she did not.</p>
<p>She climbed to her feet. For an instant, her eyes bored into his, and he saw a fury in them that he had never seen from her in the market. Then she whirled and ran, disappearing into the woods.</p>
<p>Gendry’s shoulders sagged, and he released a breath that he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He stared after her, imagining that he could still see her grey wolfskin hood slipping between the trees—but she was gone.</p>
<p>She was gone, and he had let her go, and now he had to go back to Prince Joffrey and his men—back to the job that Gendry had never hated quite so much as he did now.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hope y'all enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Their journey to Leeds now postponed, Gendry and the guards got Joffrey back to Nottingham in one irritable, irritating piece. The castle turned into a hurricane of activity as soon as they arrived; a large number of the guards were wounded, Nan’s bandits having done their jobs credibly. Straight out of the carriage Joffrey began barking commands, ordering the bandits brought to him at once.</p>
<p>The nearest guardsmen hesitated at these orders, looking between their raging prince and their sheriff, standing quietly behind him. Their confusion was plain; how were they supposed to bring in a bandit whom no one had been able to find, whose identity no one knew?</p>
<p><em>But you know, now.</em> Gendry felt sick. He wished he didn’t know. He wished he could go back to hunting a nameless, faceless thief, whose arrest would buy him everything he’d ever wanted and cost him nothing.</p>
<p>He should reveal her. He should tell his men who to look for and let them be the ones to face her, let them bring her in, so he wouldn’t have to do it himself. <em>That’s right,</em> he thought. <em>You don’t have to do it at all. You’re in command of all of these men. If one of them arrests her, you won’t have to, and you can still get your name from the queen.</em></p>
<p>The idea had some appeal, but the thought of Nan in chains made his stomach roil, no matter who put them on her.</p>
<p>He shook his head minutely at his men. They nodded, understanding, and dispersed, stepping up their paces so that it looked like they went with purpose. Despite the prince’s wroth, Gendry managed to convince him to come inside and rest. All the while, Nan’s name lay heavy on his heart.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya pulled the bandage tighter, tighter, until Anguy began swearing under his breath. “It’s for your own good,” she told him, and tied it off. “Who else still needs tending?”</p>
<p>“I think that’s all of us.” Anguy mopped the sweat from his brow on his shirtsleeve and scanned their small encampment. “Except Lem, but he’s away to the physician already.”</p>
<p>Arya nodded, trying not to think too hard about the gash one of the guards had opened in Lem’s side.</p>
<p>Lommy sat up, wincing when he put weight on his injured arm. “What now, Arry?”</p>
<p>The others turned to look at her, too. Arya’s throat felt tight. This wasn’t how the day was supposed to have gone—they were supposed to have gotten Joffrey and gotten out, not gotten stuck in a skirmish until a group of hunters happened by and helped the guards beat the bandits off.</p>
<p>It was pure bad luck. Back luck happened. But it wasn’t supposed to happen today.</p>
<p>They were still watching her. Something inside Arya curled up on itself, like a frightened child. “I need some time to think,” she muttered, and stalked off into the woods.</p>
<p>If she ignored the slight differences in the birdsong and trees and the absence of that nipping chill from the air, she could imagine that she was back in the north, running through the woods with Jon and Bran and Rickon. Back then, they had only played at being robbers and soldiers. Back then, she'd had a family, and it was whole, untouched by Cersei Lannister and her war.</p>
<p>She gritted her teeth and walked faster. It didn’t matter how much she wished she were back in the north with her family. Imagining herself there wouldn’t help her solve the problems at hand.</p>
<p>They had failed. Rather badly. Only a few of the bandits had escaped without some sort of injury, and some wouldn't be in a state to shoot a bow or swing a sword for at least a couple of weeks. And still Joffrey walked free.</p>
<p>Worst of all, Arya knew their attempt wouldn’t go unpunished. Sure, they could rob tax wagons all they wanted, and all Cersei could do was send more guards and a better sheriff—but they had attempted to kidnap her son. Neither the queen nor the prince would take this lightly.</p>
<p>Something was coming for them, and likely soon. But what was she to do about it now? Frustrated, she slammed a kick into a tree, earning herself nothing but a set of bruised toes. Growling a string of unintelligible curses, she slid to sit at the base of the tree to hold her throbbing foot.</p>
<p>She couldn’t make any sort of plan in this state. Even aside from her temper, they didn’t have enough information. How soon would Cersei learn of the attack? How was she most likely to react? What would Joffrey do in the meantime—would he continue to Leeds? Or shelter in Nottingham? Would he try to track the bandits through Sherwood himself?</p>
<p>She pictured Joffrey roving through the forest, shrieking commands that echoed dozens of yards away, slipping on the uneven ground. She snorted. That scenario, at least, was probably no threat to them.</p>
<p>If only it were the only one she had to worry about. Her amusement faded quickly. <em>What will Gendry do?</em></p>
<p>She had been meeting him in the market for so long now. She had a fair idea of the sort of man he was—grumpy, stubborn, more honorable than she expected anyone that Cersei appointed would be. Joffrey had never come up in any of their conversations, but during the attack Gendry hadn’t seemed to like him any better than she did. He may not mind the attack on a personal level, but his sense of duty would still drive him to retaliate, every bit as much as Joffrey’s rage would drive him. So what would he do?</p>
<p>Arya sat there for hours, holding her head in her hands and thinking herself in circles, until the dappled light that gleamed through the leaves blurred into the shadows of dusk. The evening wind blew cold, biting at her exposed ears and fingers.</p>
<p>It was a touch of the north, a bit of what she so sorely missed, and it cleared her mind. She hauled herself to her feet, achy after sitting so long on the hard dirt. Even if she didn’t have a clear idea of what Gendry’s plans were, she knew how she could find out.</p>
<p>She headed back to camp, limping, her toes still smarting. <em>I’ll just have to go talk to him.</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>It's a short one, but there's more forthcoming for the evening :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya fidgeted with her basket, trying not to look too anxious as she scanned the crowd for Gendry’s tall dark head. He was later than usual, and her rolls were almost all gone, along with her excuse for being in town. She had torn two to pieces herself, picking at them to ease her nerves, before she forced herself to grip the basket instead. She’d have to leave Ebben a few extra coins in his coin purse next time, to pay for them.</p>
<p>By noon, she was about to give up. Usually, if he came he did so by mid-morning. He must have been too busy to leave his castle. It made sense; after all, there had been an attempt on the crown prince’s safety only the day before. Surely that was keeping him occupied.</p>
<p>A young couple bought the last of her rolls as treats for their children, and Arya decided to accept defeat for the day. She turned towards the road out of town, telling herself she’d just have to try again tomorrow, when she saw him across the street, ducking out of the cobbler’s shop.</p>
<p>She waved at him, calling his name. He caught sight of her and stiffened. Her wave faltered—what was that for? He’d never been displeased to see her before.</p>
<p>Perhaps he saw the confusion on her face, because immediately he squared his shoulders and walked over, greeting her with a smile that Arya did not entirely believe.</p>
<p>“Sorry,” he said, turning with her towards the city gates. “It’s been a busy day.”</p>
<p>Arya watched him sidelong. He kept his face determinedly forward, never looking at her. His tone was curiously light, with none of the annoyance she had heard from him on other days when he’d complained of busyness.</p>
<p>She began to feel a bit sick. What was wrong? What was she missing?</p>
<p>
  <em>He couldn’t have seen me, could he?</em>
</p>
<p>She brushed the thought aside. If he had, she would already be in chains.</p>
<p>
  <em>He should have arrested you back in the forest, after Joffrey got away. But he let you go. Why?</em>
</p>
<p><em>That doesn’t mean he saw me,</em> she told herself firmly.</p>
<p>“Why so busy?” She made her own voice light and airy too.</p>
<p>He stammered a few inarticulate syllables before managing, “Nothing in particular, I suppose.”</p>
<p><em>Liar</em>. She fought the urge to snap at him. Instead, she grinned, as if she were only teasing. “Really? You don’t sound sure.”</p>
<p>He turned away. “Sorry, Nan, I really have to go,” he said, and all but fled.</p>
<p>Arya stared after him. Her grip tightened on her basket, the wicker creaking. <em>Think,</em> she told herself. <em>Think. You can’t just go rushing after him. He’s heading for the castle, and they won’t let you in there. Besides, you have to return Ebben’s basket.</em></p>
<p>
  <em>And you’ve spent months learning to be patient, to chip away at Cersei’s coffers little by little, and wait for your chance. You can be patient now. Just wait to see him again tomorrow.</em>
</p>
<p>But there was a pit in her stomach that was telling her that he wouldn’t be coming to see her anymore. She wasn’t sure what had changed, but something had, and she did not like now knowing what it was.</p>
<p>
  <em>Wait, Arya. Patience.</em>
</p>
<p>“Fuck that,” she muttered.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Two hours later, after she’d returned the basket to Ebben and Mary’s house, Arya leaned against the wall of the alehouse across from the castle gates. Six guards flanked them instead of the usual two, no doubt in reaction to the attack on the prince. Hidden by the patrons passing in and out of the alehouse, Arya curled her lip at the guardsmen. She wished she could find satisfaction at the sight of them instead—how they must fear her, to triple their defenses on the gate—but she felt only frustration that the prince was still safe in the castle.</p>
<p>Very little traffic was allowed through the gates, all of it carefully vetted. One of the guards checked over each cart and wagon while another questioned each driver or merchant, and a clerk standing behind them scribbled on a roll of parchment every time someone was granted entrance.</p>
<p><em>Definitely not the gates, then.</em> Arya turned south, strolling along the lane that ran along the base of Castle Rock. It dipped downhill as she neared the edge of town, and above it the formidable Rock grew taller and steeper. She examined it as she walked, calculating. It was a long way to go, but she could climb it. She had learned to scale the walls of their own castle in the north from Bran. It wouldn’t be excessively different to climb this.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, she couldn’t just go straight up. She turned in a slow circle, noting the windows facing her from the other side of the road, noting the villagers passing by—not many, in this part of town, but enough to ensure that she wouldn’t get up the rock and over the wall before someone spotted her.</p>
<p>She kept walking. Gradually the town fell away behind her as the lane turned west, running under the tallest section of the hill between it and a lively stream. No one seemed to be nearby, and the copse of trees that now lined the opposite side of the road stood quiet. Quickly, before anyone could come along and see her, Arya girded her skirt, tying it up above her legs, then for a moment flexed her fingers and bounced up and down a few times on her tiptoes. No sense in putting it off, she thought, and began to climb.</p>
<p>She slotted herself into one of the crevices in the rock, where she could brace herself against each side, and hauled herself off the ground. She took her time, making sure each toehold was secure before putting any weight on it. Bran had scrambled up sheer surfaces like a squirrel, but she was not Bran, and it had been a long time since she'd had to climb anything like this. It was safer to take her time.</p>
<p>On this side, the Rock wasn't  entirely sheer, fortunately, and for most of the climb Arya didn't struggle too much. But the crevice was growing narrower, and she soon had to shift over the ledge out onto open stone. Immediately the wind began to buffet her, but she held fast, her fingers straining, and focused on the next toehold. And the next, and the next.</p>
<p>Finally she came to the top of the Rock. It leveled out for a couple of feet leading up to the castle walls, leaving a ledge just wide enough to stand on. Arya pulled herself up onto it, leaning against the wall to catch her breath and stretch first her wrists and forearms, then her ankles and toes. All the while, wind teased her, tugging on her hair like Rickon had when he was a baby.</p>
<p>Once her breathing slowed down, Arya tilted her head back to look up the wall. She couldn’t see at this angle whether there were any soldiers on the battlements nearby, but perhaps she would be able to hear them if she were closer. She steeled herself and began scaling the wall.</p>
<p>Hand- and foot-holds were harder to find between the stone blocks than on the rock face. Her pace slowed even more. She knew it was safer not to rush, but she had begun to tremble with fatigue. If she took much longer, she would be in trouble.</p>
<p><em>This was a stupid idea.</em> <em>What are you even going to say to him, when you see him? How will you explain why you're here? Or how you're here?</em></p>
<p>Her toe slipped from its hold. Arya gasped and pressed closer to the rock, shifting to lean on her other leg, until she steadied herself and found a new toehold. Breathing hard, she leaned her forehead against the cool stone. </p>
<p><em>Too late to worry about it</em> <em>now. </em></p>
<p>Gritting her teeth, she pushed on. Three long minutes later, she was clinging to the wall just a few feet beneath the crenellations, and paused to listen.</p>
<p>Above the rush of the wind, she heard a pair of heavy footsteps nearby—approaching—passing. Then nothing.</p>
<p>Trying to keep silent through the effort, Arya pulled herself up the last few feet to grab onto the bottom the crenellation, scowling against the scream of her aching limbs, then hauled herself up high enough to peek over the top.</p>
<p>One guard had his back to her, walking away. Another stood some ways down, bending over to check something on the bottom of his boot.</p>
<p><em>Now or never.</em> Arya heaved herself over the crenellations and rolled to the far side of the battlements. A quick glance over the side showed her a deserted courtyard and a wagon of hay a few paces down. She ran them and vaulted over the inside wall and into the hay.</p>
<p>The wagon creaked unhappily under her sudden weight. Arya scrambled out as quick as she could and pulled at her skirts to make them fall properly again. Hoping no one had noticed her, she darted into the nearest door she could find.</p>
<p>She stood in the middle of a busy kitchen, filled with half a dozen workers chopping vegetables or mixing a sauce or stirring a stew. The scent of roasting meat filled the air.</p>
<p>Arya ducked her head and strode towards the far side of the room, hoping to be taken for another worker just passing through, but bumped right into a small scullery girl. She looked up at Arya with a scowl, and with a start Arya recognized the little girl Gendry had taken from the marketplace.</p>
<p>The girl recognized her, too. Her eyes got wide, but Arya put a finger on her lips and gave a wink, hoping the girl would think it a game.</p>
<p>She didn’t react except to take Arya’s hand and pull her to the far side of the room, pointing her through the next door. “Thank you,” Arya whispered to her, squeezing her hand, and slipped through it.</p>
<p>She stood at the end of a plain, narrow corridor. Hoping fervently that there wouldn’t be any guards at the other end, Arya set off down it.</p>
<p>She had gotten in. Her entire body was sore, but she had done it. She should have felt proud, accomplished, but instead her chest filled with anxiety. She should have planned this better—hell, she should have planned at all. How <em>was</em> she going to explain her presence to Gendry?</p>
<p>
  <em>You could always find a way out, and try to find him in town like normal tomorrow.</em>
</p>
<p>The thought of waiting that long set her teeth to grinding. She needed to know what retribution to expect from the prince, and when. Not just for herself and her vendetta against the Lannisters, but for all the men lying injured back at camp. And she wanted to know why Gendry had been so cold towards her in town. Her steps quickened.</p>
<p><em>I'll think of something. </em>She had gotten as far as she had on wit and skill. Skill had gotten her into the castle--if only just--and wit would get her out.</p>
<p>Besides, she didn't think Gendry would punish her for coming, even if she did have to admit that she'd snuck in. He might want to arrest <em>her</em>, but she trusted that he wouldn't arrest Nan.</p>
<p>She just... she had to know what was coming.</p>
<p>Even if she didn’t have a plan, at least she had a good memory. She had grown up in a castle of her own, and if her father’s habits were anything to go by, her best bet would be to find the sheriff’s study or solar. With any luck, that’s where Gendry would be, and she could get some answers.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>That was not, in fact, where Gendry was. After leaving the cobbler and seeing Nan, he had fled to the castle forge and volunteered himself to the smith, under the excuse that if they were to defend the prince properly, they needed all their equipment in order, and he just wanted to help the man keep up. The smith looked a little doubtful, but evidently did not want to refuse a request from his sheriff, and so Gendry helped tend to dented armor and chipped swords for the next couple of hours.</p>
<p>The work was familiar and calming, but the knot in his stomach never completely eased. He knew it had been a mistake to go out into the town at all today. He knew he couldn’t face Nan. He had lain awake half the night fretting over it, but he’d gone anyway, with the flimsy reasoning that his boot had a small hole in the seam.</p>
<p>He knew he had a second pair. He knew he could have sent a servant or a guard to speak to the cobbler instead. Instead, like an idiot, he had gone himself.</p>
<p>If he were honest with himself, which he did not want to be, he knew why he had gone. In one way at least, it didn’t matter that Nan was the bandit in the wolfskin hood. He still wanted to see her. The thought of cutting her out of his life, even if it made his job easier, made his chest hurt.</p>
<p>Every time his thoughts veered in this direction, he hammered a bit harder on whatever bit of metal lay before him. He added a few new dents to a breastplate he was supposed to be mending, prompting the blacksmith to come over and find a polite way to throw him out of the forge.</p>
<p>Embarrassed, Gendry took a moment to lean against the wall of the courtyard outside of the forge. <em>What am I doing? Am I a boy again? Get yourself together, Gendry.</em></p>
<p>He pushed away from the wall and straightened his shoulders, trying to feel like a sheriff. He should go to his study, or check on the prince, or do any number of proper sheriff’s duties. The problem was, he did not want to do any of those things. The other problem was that he didn't know what he did want to do.</p>
<p>A flash of movement across the courtyard caught his eye. Something was falling from the battlements, a blur of pale green and brown. It landed in a cart full of hay, sending a small plume of stems skyward, and then a small figure rolled out and got to its feet--a slight, brown-haired woman.</p>
<p>Gendry’s heart leaped into his throat. <em>That looks like Nan.</em></p>
<p>She pulled at her skirts, which had been tied up around her thighs, and slipped into the door to the kitchens. Gendry gaped after her, feeling rather like he’d stumbled into a dream.</p>
<p><em>Snap out of it.</em> Why had she come? She wasn’t wearing her hood.</p>
<p><em>How did she get here? She can't have </em>climbed <em>in?</em></p>
<p>Gendry ran after her, startling the kitchen staff when he burst through the door. He stammered out apologies as he hurried through, barely avoiding falling over the little scullery girl, and made his way out into the hallway just in time to see Nan’s back disappearing around the corner. He sprinted around it and called her name.</p>
<p>She froze midstep, then slowly turned back. “Gendry?”</p>
<p>He strode towards her. “What are you doing here?” he hissed.</p>
<p>The shock cleared from her face. She grabbed his arm and said, “Looking for you. You were acting strange today. Why?”</p>
<p>A wild laugh escaped him. “You wanted a chat, so you—what—scaled Castle Rock? Climbed over the wall?”</p>
<p>She paled. “Did you see me? Did anyone else?”</p>
<p>“I don’t know, but—” He rubbed hand over his face. “Nan, you can’t be here—”</p>
<p>Voices echoed down the hall from around the next corner. Both of them tensed, then Gendry grabbed Nan’s arm and pulled her back the way they’d come.</p>
<p>A few yards before the door to the kitchens, he pushed open another door and led her down a short flight of steps to the wine cellar. “There’s a tunnel down here,” he told her, “that leads out to the far side of the Rock, right at the base by the pond. You need to go.”</p>
<p>“Wait.” She pulled him to a stop. “Something’s wrong. Something’s happened, and I want you to tell me what.”</p>
<p>Half of Gendry wanted to laugh, and the other half wanted to scream. “You climbed over the castle wall just to check on me?”</p>
<p>“I—well, it—I couldn’t get through the gate. The guards—”</p>
<p>For once, she was the one struggling for words. It would have made for a nice change, but he knew that if he kept pressing, he would just be making her lie to him. It was one thing for Nan the market girl to know how to scale that cliff, and that wall. It was less surprising from the bandit of the wolf’s hood.</p>
<p>
  <em>I should arrest her. I can’t possibly arrest her. Why is she really here? I should arrest her. But I can’t, I can’t.</em>
</p>
<p>She crossed her arms. “What was wrong, in the market? You seemed fine until you saw me. And what’s with all the extra guards at the gate?”</p>
<p>“I was fine the whole time. I even came and said hello, remember?”</p>
<p>“I’m not stupid, Gendry. You didn’t even want to look at me, you practically ran away from me—”</p>
<p>“What does it matter?” He stepped closer to her. “So what if I did? Why do you care? We’re barely even friends—we don’t know the first thing about each other.”</p>
<p>Nan frowned, looking almost hurt. “That’s not true.”</p>
<p>“Yes, it is. I don’t even know what you like to do in your spare time. You never told me.” <em>I found out anyway—archery and fencing and highway robbery.</em> “And what about you? Tell me one thing you’ve learned about me, in all this time.”</p>
<p>“I—what do you—”</p>
<p>“Right, that’s what I—”</p>
<p>“So what if we don’t know whatever list of facts about each other? I know you’re stubborn as a bull—I know—”</p>
<p>“It doesn’t take long for people to learn that about me, I’m told,” Gendry said dryly. “I’m not sure that counts.”</p>
<p>“Well, why not?” She stepped forward and shoved at his chest, although he barely rocked back. “You asked me what I knew about you—I don’t have to know your life story to know you.”</p>
<p>“That doesn’t matter—I never expected to learn your life story—”</p>
<p>“Is that why you were avoiding me, then? You got your feelings hurt? From what? What could I possibly have done in one day that—”</p>
<p>Gendry couldn’t contain it anymore. “You tried to kidnap the prince!”</p>
<p>Nan went very still, frozen halfway to shoving him again. “What?” she asked, very quietly.</p>
<p>In contrast, Gendry found himself breathing hard, as if he had just finished a sprint. “You tried to kidnap the prince. The crown prince of England. You tried—I saw you, Nan! I fought you there in the woods!”</p>
<p>She stepped back. In the shadows of the cellar he couldn’t quite make out her expression. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”</p>
<p>Gendry hadn’t wanted to reveal that he knew, but there was no going back now. “I fought you in Sherwood Forest. You had your mask and your hood, but I recognized you anyway. I didn’t want to see you in the market because I knew I should arrest you, not chat with you about my day.”</p>
<p>“So why didn’t you?”</p>
<p>He pretended he hadn’t heard her, his heart now beating so hart it almost hurt. “And I wanted to arrest you! I’ve wanted to arrest you for weeks, so I can leave this place and go—go home, to my new home, because arresting you is the only way to get there, but—”</p>
<p>“Gendry, why didn’t you?”</p>
<p>When had he stepped so close to her? Her face was tilted up towards him, her iron eyes intense, her mouth a grim line. “I couldn’t.”</p>
<p>“Why not?”</p>
<p>He grabbed her wrist. “Come on, you need to get to that tunnel. You can’t be here. Especially after you scaled the damn wall to get in.”</p>
<p>She didn’t protest as he led her to the back corner of the cellar and shoved a wooden shelf out of the way to reveal a small door. “Go,” he said, stepping back.</p>
<p>“Gendry.” She planted herself in front of him. “Why didn’t you arrest me?”</p>
<p>The words burned in his chest, but he couldn't bring himself to say them. “Be careful,” he said instead. “The queen is sending someone to track you down—an assassin called the Faceless Man. From the rumors, he’s extremely dangerous. I don't want... I mean, I don't want you to...”</p>
<p>She searched his eyes. “Thank you,” she said softly. And then, again: “Gendry, why aren’t you arresting me?”</p>
<p>His heart pounded. He was already revealing things to her—why not this too?</p>
<p>He put a hand on her cheek, tilted her face up, and kissed her. Just once, lightly, a feathertouch against her lips. She froze and he backed away, his face burning so bright he wondered if she could see it even in the gloom. “I’m sorry. Please, Nan, just… go.”</p>
<p>She shoved the door open and dove into the tunnel. Gendry stared after her for a moment, then covered his face in his hands and groaned.</p>
<p>
  <em>Now what do I do?</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I will admit to not doing an excess of research (if any of y'all are Robin Hood/medieval history aficionados, I'm sorry ;-;) but I did do a bit, and I have a reference for what the castle and the Rock look like (although even this is a little anachronistic, ngl): </p>
<p> </p>
<p>  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Hope y'all enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, so this chapter has the first action scene where we really see anyone getting hurt. It's not super graphic, but it is the most detailed so far, so I wanted to give a quick heads up in case that sort of thing upsets anyone</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya threw herself into planning for the assassin’s arrival. She told the others about him, although she didn’t tell them where she had been when Gendry gave her the news. There was too much about that story she didn’t want to share.</p>
<p>That didn’t stop her from kicking herself a few times a day for charging into the castle so recklessly. It did help stop her from thinking about how he’d said goodbye. She wasn’t sure what to think of that, but she did know that the memory left her a strange cocktail of emotions that she didn't want to sort through at the moment.</p>
<p>“We have to assume that he’ll find us quickly,” she said. “And I don’t think we should try to stop him. I think our best bet is to force a confrontation.”</p>
<p>“How would we do that?” asked Anguy, raising an eyebrow.</p>
<p>“We can draw him off into the woods and set up a trap. Ambush him.”</p>
<p>“How do we draw him off? Do you propose to just go strolling through Nottingham in your hood?”</p>
<p>Arya opened her mouth, but had nothing to say. She couldn’t tell them that the sheriff already knew who she was. “What do you suggest, then?”</p>
<p>“I’m not sure we can prepare for this one, Arry.” Anguy leaned forward, the firelight casting ominous shadows over his face. “This isn’t something we’ve dealt with before.”</p>
<p>“We barely even now what it is,” Little Jon pointed out.</p>
<p>“I’ve heard of the Faceless Men,” Arya said. “But only as boogeymen.”</p>
<p>“That’s it?” Lommy asked. “That’s all any of us know?”</p>
<p>Arya sighed and rubbed her aching temples. “If we can’t force a fight, we'll just have to make sure we're ready for one. From now on, we post a watch at all times, and no one is to go anywhere alone. No one is to be alone, ever.”</p>
<p>Lommy snorted. “What, do you want to have to stand next to me while I piss?”</p>
<p>They argued for nearly an hour, but in the end no one could come up with anything better. Arya drew up a chart to assign partners and watches, and they all turned in for a restless night.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>The next week passed in a blur of stress. Everyone developed permanent shadows under their eyes as they lost sleep to worries and watches, and their camp, which had been for so long a place of camaraderie and relaxation, turned tense. Hardly a moment passed when someone didn't snap or scowl at someone else.</p>
<p>Rumors of the Faceless Man even reached the laypeople of Nottingham. No one knew who started the the rumors, but stories spread like wildfire, and were unfailingly carried back to camp. Some said they were the last of the druids, turned to murder in vengeance for felled holy trees. Others said they were demons, or demon-spawn, or angels of death sent to reap the souls of the sinful. Most said that they wore a mask of pure white, and moved with an eerie, deadly grace.</p>
<p>Arya had never had much patience for ghost stories, and these were no exception. She had never come across an enemy she couldn’t fight, never one who wasn’t made of flesh and blood just like her, and she didn’t think this Faceless Man would be any exception. All the stories did was put her on edge, antsy to finally have the fight and be done with it.</p>
<p>She didn’t think she would have to wait too long. After all, the Faceless Man was after her. He would come right to her, and she would be ready when he did.</p>
<p>As it happened, however, she was not.</p>
<p>Her partner that day was Lommy, who was perhaps her least favorite of the band to have to be around all day. He still disliked the idea of their partner system, and wasn't about to let anyone forget it.</p>
<p>They were on the way to the stream to fetch water for the camp that evening, the forest turning gold with the setting sun. It would have been lovely, if Lommy hadn't been complaining again about his lack of privacy. Arya pulled her wolfskin mantle tighter around her shoulders, as if to shield herself from the sound of his voice.</p>
<p>“You can put up with it for a few weeks,” she snapped at last. “The alternative might well be death, you know.”</p>
<p>He rolled his eyes. “It might, but the chances of that on any given day can't be that high. Is it too much to ask for just an hour or two—”</p>
<p>Their only warning was a quiet rustle in a gorse bush nearby. Then an arrow whistled out, straight at Lommy’s throat.</p>
<p>Arya grabbed him by the back of the shirt and threw him aside, just barely ducking a second arrow as it flew for her own neck. It passed so close that she felt the wind of its passage through her hair.</p>
<p>Instinctively, she grabbed for her own bow, but her hand closed on empty air. Her bow was back at camp, where Anguy had promised to oil it and change the frayed string. She bit back a curse.</p>
<p>Another arrow flew. Arya drew her sword and knocked it aside, searching the forest behind it for the shooter.</p>
<p>There—the Faceless man stood some twenty paces away, half-hidden in the gloom beneath an old oak, another arrow already knocked on the string of his longbow. None of the stories had been true, Arya saw. Before her stood a gangling man with a plain, unremarkable face. He was dressed in simple grey clothing, and would have blended right into any town, except for the snow-white silk scarf around his neck.</p>
<p>“Lommy—” She batted the next arrow away. “—get to cover, he's over there—”</p>
<p>The Faceless Man, however, was lowering his bow. He leaned it against the oak and drew a pair of long, narrow knives from sheathes on his arms.</p>
<p>“Lommy,” Arya said again, her eyes fixed on the assassin. “Get out of here.”</p>
<p>“I will not,” he protested, climbing to his feet and drawing his own knives. “They’d never let me hear the end of it if I ran away.”</p>
<p>“For heaven’s sake, that’s what you’re worried about right—”</p>
<p>The Man threw one of his knives at Lommy’s chest. He sidestepped it, but the Man was moving, sprinting for them, already palming another knife. Arya darted forward to parry the stab he drove towards Lommy’s side. Lommy jumped away with a curse.</p>
<p>Arya could barely keep up with the Faceless Man’s attacks. He drove a flurry of them at her, unrelenting and fearsomely fast. She was used to fighting swordsmen who attacked straight ahead, who stood sturdy, who had been trained in no-nonsense, straightforward swordplay. Those fights had not prepared her for this one. The Faceless Man fought more like she did, fluid, moving, circling and spinning—but he had two weapons where she had only one.</p>
<p>Too quickly, she began to gather small cuts—across her hip, down her forearm, across her collarbone. Beneath the burn of pain, she began to feel a twinge of fear.</p>
<p>Lommy did what he could. He tried to flank the Man, but earned only a slash across the back of his hand for the trouble. Hissing, he dropped one dagger. The Faceless Man’s eyes tracked its fall, and he turned to press the advantage.</p>
<p><em>Now’s your chance.</em> Arya stabbed toward the Man’s kidney. Her sword met its mark, but not deep enough—and as soon as it did, the Man whirled, lashing out with a kick to Arya’s chin that snapped her head back and sent her stumbling.</p>
<p>She saw stars. Groaning, she dragged her sword back up, expecting that the Man would be on her again. Instead, when her vision cleared, she saw him feint to Lommy's left, then swing right, around to his back. Dragging the scarf from his neck, he threw it around Lommy’s neck and pulled tight. Lommy choked, his eyes bulging, and dropped his second knife to scrabble at his neck.</p>
<p>Cold fear flooded Arya’s limbs now. If she’d had her bow, she could have shot out the Man’s eye, just visible past Lommy’s ear, but she didn’t, and Lommy’s face was turning a terrifying shade of blue—</p>
<p>A glint among the leaves caught her eye—the knife that the Faceless Man had thrown. She snatched it up and sprinted towards them, colliding hard with Lommy’s midriff and knocking them both to the ground.</p>
<p>Arya stabbed hard with the knife, driving low to avoid hitting Lommy, and felt the blade sink into flesh. A gasping grunt sounded from below, and the Faceless Man shoved Lommy and Arya off, rolling away from Arya’s second stab. He rose, one hand pressing against his wound, the other pulling a new knife from a sheath on his leg.</p>
<p>Arya got to her feet to face him, raising her bloodied knife and sword. She looked the Faceless Man in the eye and saw nothing there—no malice, no pain, no gleam of adrenaline. He could have been tying his shoe, for all the expression he showed.</p>
<p>They clashed, one last time. The Man was losing blood, and while Arya’s wounds hurt, the sight of him slowing down was enough to spur her forward, faster, faster—</p>
<p>She knocked away his knife with hers, leaving him open, and her sword landed at last.</p>
<p>He grunted as it pierced his chest, looked down at it with vague surprise. Then he looked up to meet Arya’s glare, and smiled. “I am only one of many,” he said softly, his voice rasping. “There are a thousand faces who will hunt you after me.”</p>
<p>She shoved him away in horror. He crumpled, his eyes glazing over. Arya watched until his breathing ceased, just to make sure, then turned back to Lommy.</p>
<p>He still lay on the ground where the Faceless Man had shoved him. His face had returned to its normal color, and his chest rose and fell, but his eyes were closed. Arya's stomach clenched.</p>
<p>“Lommy?”</p>
<p>He didn’t respond. <em>He should have woken up by now</em>. She fell to her knees next to him, grabbing his shoulders. “What’s the matter? Why—”</p>
<p>One of her hands felt warm, warmer than it should. She let go of his shoulder and saw blood. Slowly, shakily, she lifted Lommy’s side to see a deep wound next to his shoulder blade.</p>
<p><em>How? When did he stab him?</em> Arya felt curiously distant from herself, as if she were looking at Lommy's wound through a fog. <em>I have to get him help.</em></p>
<p>She snatched the Faceless Man’s scarf from the ground and bound it tight around Lommy’s shoulder. She felt for his pulse—it was present, if weak—then steeled herself with a deep breath and hauled his torso over her shoulders.</p>
<p>He stirred, groaning. “I’m sorry,” she said, pulling on his arm to settle him more securely. “I’m sorry, Lommy, I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>She kept saying it the entire way back to camp. She couldn’t stop. Lommy never replied, but she could feel the weak rise and fall of his breath behind her head. She could also feel the warmth of his blood flowing through the bandage and down onto her back. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>Little Jon, standing watch, saw them first. He shouted in alarm and ran to meet them, taking Lommy gently from Arya’s shoulders. She staggered as his weight was lifted. “We can’t help him here,” she said. “He needs a physician.”</p>
<p>Little Jon looked down at Lommy’s pale face. “I don’t think we can get him there safely.”</p>
<p>“Do what you can. I’ll bring the physician here.”</p>
<p>“Here?” Lem stood, his eyes wide. "Surely we can get him to town in time—"</p>
<p>“We’ll relocate afterward. Start packing. Anguy, come with me,” she said, heading for their horses.</p>
<p>“Wait, Arry,” he said. “You’re wearing your wolfskin. You can’t go into town with that on.”</p>
<p>“That doesn’t matter right now,” she said, yanking her saddle tight and swinging on. Anguy pressed his lips together and followed without another word.</p>
<p>They rode for Nottingham as fast as the horses could run. They skidded to a halt in front of the physician’s house as the full dark of night fell, their horses huffing and shining with sweat. Arya leapt to the ground and hammered on the door.</p>
<p>“What, God, what in the name of—” He yanked it open.</p>
<p>“You’re needed in Sherwood Forest,” Arya told him calmly. “Now.”</p>
<p>He looked her over, his eyes lingering on the wolfskin around her shoulders. “Alright. Let me ready my horse.”</p>
<p>“There’s no time for that,” Arya said. “Take mine.”</p>
<p>“Wait,” Anguy called, “what —”</p>
<p>“It's faster this way. I'll come along behind."</p>
<p>Anguy’s eyes narrowed. “I don't believe—”</p>
<p>“Hurry.” She held the physician’s bag while he mounted, then passed it up to him. “Lommy needs help, and someone has to show the doctor how to get there.”</p>
<p>Anguy glared at her for a second. “Don’t do anything stupid,” he growled, then wheeled his horse away and galloped off, the physician hard on his heels.</p>
<p>Arya turned towards the castle and pulled her hood over her head. <em>I'm sorry, Anguy. I'm sorry, Lommy. </em></p>
<p>This was all her fault. Lommy lay wounded—<em>maybe dying</em>, part of her whispered—because of a man the queen had sent after her. Because of her need to hurt Cersei, because she had dragged all the others into it with her, put them in harm's way for her own personal goals. Her shoulders began to shake, and she ducked into an alleyway as the tears started.</p>
<p><em>Stop. Stop. You don't have time for this.</em> She slid into a crouch against the wall, dropping her head down to rest on her knees, wrapping her arms around herself. Her tears were warm as they seeped through her trouser legs. Lommy's blood had been, too, though it was now dry on her back.</p>
<p>
  <em>It's all my fault.</em>
</p>
<p><em>You're right.</em> She took a deep, trembling breath, and straightened. <em>It is your fault, so you have to fix it. </em><em>A thousand faces, he said. There will be more. You have to stop them.</em></p>
<p>The stories had gotten one thing right—the Faceless Man had been deadly, deadlier than anyone Arya had come across before. If the others were like him, she may not be able to fight them off. And what if another one of her companions got in the way again?</p>
<p>She couldn’t let this happen to anyone else. She couldn’t let any more Faceless Men set foot in Nottingham. She had to stop them before they came, and she could think of only one way to do that. </p>
<p>She wiped her face and slipped back out to the street. Moving as fast as she could without drawing attention, she circled around to the northern edge of Castle Rock, past the edge of town, where the tunnel from the castle cellar had ended. It was grimy and damp, wet from a rainstorm that morning, but Arya set her jaw and pulled herself inside.</p>
<p>She had to take care of this. She had to get to Joffrey. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya took a moment in the wine cellar to catch her breath. Climbing up through the tunnel was far easier than climbing the wall had been, but the close air and pressing darkness had taken a toll.</p>
<p>Her goal was simple. <em>Find Joffrey. Make him call off the Faceless Men, whatever it takes.</em></p>
<p>She took stock of herself. She had her sword and her hood, and the knife she’d taken from the Faceless Man, but nothing else. No bow, not even a scarf. She took the knife to the bottom of her tunic, cutting off a strip long enough to wrap around her face. It was a poor excuse for her normal scarf, but it would have to do.</p>
<p>Once she’d recovered, she cracked the door open, checking the corridor outside. All seemed quiet, so she slipped out and followed it up, around the corner, past where Gendry had found her and into unfamiliar territory.</p>
<p>She didn’t hear anyone nearby. It was late by now, and with any luck most of the keep would be turning in. Her only concern should be the guards.</p>
<p>The corridor curved gently to the right as she ran. She thought over what she could see of the castle from the outside. The kitchen lay off of the smaller courtyard. She must be running alongside the larger now, towards the main keep.</p>
<p>Her best guess was that Joffrey would be there, probably somewhere near the top. She set her jaw and quickened her pace. It wouldn’t be easy to get up there, and it would be even harder to get out, she knew. But she had to. For Lommy’s sake, and Anguy’s, and Little Jon and Hot Pie and Lem and all the rest.</p>
<p><em>Be quiet as a shadow</em>, she told herself, <em>and quick </em><em>as a cat. You can do this.</em></p>
<p>Light glowed ahead, a brighter hallway crossing hers. She pressed herself into a shadowy doorway as a trio of guards passed the intersection. Their footsteps and voices faded, but Arya counted an extra minute of silence before setting off again, just in case.</p>
<p>She hesitated before stepping into the light, but no one was nearby to see. She judged that she'd made it to the main keep; a faded carpet covered the stone floor, and here and there on the walls between torches hung paintings and tapestries. Behind her, towards the working parts of the castle, there were no such luxuries.</p>
<p>She went on, ducking into corners and doorways whenever she heard anyone nearby, and began to search for a way to the upper floors. Before long, she found one--a spiral staircase, yawning into darkness above her, lit more sparingly than the hallway. She frowned at it. Once she started up, there would be nowhere to hide.</p>
<p><em>Dawdling won’t help you, or your friends,</em> she told herself. <em>You can only go further in, or leave.</em></p>
<p>Leaving wasn’t an option. She started up the stairs, trying to listen past the tap of her feet and the pounding of her heart. She peered down each landing to see if she could gather any clues as to where to find Joffrey, but they all led down hallways that looked more or less the same—clean and bright, but faded with age. Her instincts pushed her on, telling her to keep looking. </p>
<p>Peering down the third hall, she almost didn’t hear the footsteps in time. A servant rounded the center column of the staircase, almost running straight into her. She watched, with that peculiar slow clarity of adrenaline, as his eyes went wide and his mouth opened to call for help.</p>
<p>In a flash, her sword was drawn and at his throat. “Quiet,” she whispered. “I’m not here to hurt anyone.” <em>Well, no</em><em>t you, anyway.</em></p>
<p>His mouth closed, but trembled. He looked up at the ceiling as if afraid to look at her.</p>
<p>“I’m not going to hurt you,” she insisted. “But I also can’t allow you to call down the guard on me. Look at me.”</p>
<p>He shook his head, eyes still glued heavenward.</p>
<p>“Look. At. Me.”</p>
<p>Slowly, tremulously, he lowered his gaze, and finally saw the wolfskin. “Oh, my—you’re—”</p>
<p>“I am. Are you going to turn me in?”</p>
<p>“No, of course not—you’ve practically saved my family, after the tax hikes, you've—but—”</p>
<p>“Then get into one of those rooms,” Arya said, jerking her head down the hall behind her. “And stay there for one hour.”</p>
<p>“I can’t, I have duties to—”</p>
<p>“Not tonight, you don’t. Please.”</p>
<p>“O-okay... Alright. I will, just—” He edged around her, fumbling along the wall for the closest door handle. “One hour?”</p>
<p>“One hour,” she said, and lowered her sword. He nodded, and the door thudded shut behind him.</p>
<p>She let out a sigh and turned back to the staircase, just in time to see a guard step onto the landing. His jaw fell open at the sight of her.</p>
<p>“What the—”</p>
<p>Arya lunged, smashing the guard’s face with the pommel of her sword. He grunted but stayed up, and she hit him again. His eyes rolled back, and he slumped towards the ground. Arya grabbed hold of his breastplate just in time to keep him—and his heavy armor—from crashing down the stairs.</p>
<p>She lowered him gently to the carpet. “I’m sorry,” she breathed. “Had to do it.”</p>
<p>“Willem?” Metal footsteps, at least two pairs, clanked up the staircase towards her.</p>
<p>“Shit.” Arya leapt over the unconscious guard and flew up the stairs ahead of the guards. A few seconds later, she heard them shouting as they found their fellow on the ground.</p>
<p>The staircase ended at the next floor, opening onto a wider, brighter hallway than the others. She sprinted down it, her footsteps cushioned by a thick yellow-gold carpet, far finer than the ones downstairs. Halfway down, she spotted a pair of heavy wooden doors, handsomely polished.</p>
<p>They were her best bet. She dropped one shoulder and slammed into them. They burst open to reveal a well-furnished study, hung with old tapestries half-obscured by red Lannister banners.</p>
<p>She shoved the doors shut behind her and slammed the lock into place. Only then did she turn to see Joffrey standing wild-eyed behind the desk.</p>
<p>Arya couldn’t help the feral smile that spread across her face. “Found you.”</p>
<p>He managed half a shout before she was on him. She quieted him with a punch to the jaw, then sent him to the floor with a kick to the back of his knee. He began to sputter threats as knee hit the ground, but Arya pressed a hand over his mouth. “Stay quiet,” she told him calmly. “I won’t be letting the guards stop me. Not this time.”</p>
<p>He shoved hard against the desk, attempting to knock her back into the wall. With a grunt, she braced herself against the force and pushed Joffrey down, holding him there with the tip of her sword under his chin.</p>
<p>“You’re going to call off the Faceless Men,” she told him. “Right now.”</p>
<p>“I will do no such th—ow—”</p>
<p>She pressed her sword down just enough to break the skin. “You will.”</p>
<p>“Why would I?” Joffrey glared up at her, his lip curled. “You deserve everything they could do to you.”</p>
<p>“Call them off, or I’ll do more than nick your chin.”</p>
<p>“If you touch me,” he hissed, “my mother will have your skull for a chamber pot, you—”</p>
<p>She moved her sword up to hover above his eye. He fell silent to watch it. “All your spoiled playacting won’t fool me,” she growled. “Call off the Faceless Men, or write to your mother to do it. However it has to be done.”</p>
<p>At that moment, something—someone—thudded against the door. Someone outside was shouting, most likely the guards. She gritted her teeth and set her foot on Joffrey’s hand, leaning hard on his pinky. “Do it.”</p>
<p>“Fine—fine—” He coughed, trying to return his voice to its normal pitch. “But you have to let me—”</p>
<p>Another shout through the door: “Back! Let me through!” Gendry’s voice was muffled but unmistakable.</p>
<p>Arya’s heart stuttered. She bent down to yank Joffrey to his feet, then pushed him to the desk at swordpoint. “Write. Now. Quickly.”</p>
<p>The doors shook against a heavy impact, the sound garnished with the crackle of splintering wood. Arya pressed her swordpoint under Joffrey’s ear, drawing a thin well of blood. “Now!”</p>
<p>With a crash, the doors flew open, bits of wood shattering away from Gendry’s armored shoulder. Half a dozen guards spilled in after him. Arya spun to face them, rotating around Joffrey to keep her sword on his neck.</p>
<p>Gendry locked eyes with her and skidded to a halt. For a heartbeat, they were the only ones in the room. Arya tensed, waiting for her name to pass his lips, for him to give the command to arrest her.</p>
<p>The heartbeat passed, and Gendry still stood silent. But Joffrey moved, shoving her sword to the side and diving toward the safety of the guards. “Arrest him!” he screeched. “Arrest the thief!”</p>
<p>The guards surged forward. Arya shoved the chair at them, halting the first two, but a third came around the desk in an attempt to flank her. She spun to parry his blow, threw her knife to ward off a fourth charging up beside him, and sidestepped a fifth guard lunging to tackle her about the midriff. He crashed into a bookshelf, and the resulting crash almost drowned out Joffrey’s continued shrieks.</p>
<p>“Sheriff, seize him! Hang him! Hang him and hold up your end of your bargain, or my mother won’t hold up hers—”</p>
<p><em>What? </em>Despite herself, Arya glanced back at Gendry. His face had gone pale, and he hadn’t moved an inch.</p>
<p>Another guard leapt for her, and Arya forced herself to focus. She drove him back with a swipe of his sword, but the others were righting themselves and would soon be on her as well.</p>
<p>Six on one. It wasn’t difficult math. Arya couldn’t fight her way out of this one, especially not with all the other guards that were surely on their way. She didn’t have her bow, didn’t have a plan, didn’t have an ally.</p>
<p>She looked at Gendry. His blue eyes were wide, and if she was not mistaken, scared.</p>
<p>
  <em>This should stop the Faceless Men from hurting anyone else, at least.</em>
</p>
<p>She dropped her sword, raised her hands, and shouted, “Wait!”</p>
<p>The guards hesitated, looking back at their sheriff.</p>
<p>“I’ll go quietly,” she said, “as long as the assassins get called off. Please. They’re after me—if I’m in the dungeon—”</p>
<p>Gendry jerked his head in a nod. Two guards stepped up to seize her arms. </p>
<p>“You don’t have the authority,” Joffrey shouted at Gendry.</p>
<p>Gendry barely looked at him. “They don’t have a target anymore—there wouldn't be any point in their coming here now. Write to the queen, Your Highness. Tell her of your—” His mouth twisted. “—victory here.”</p>
<p>Joffrey’s eyes narrowed, looking between Arya and Gendry. “Wait,” he said. “First, I want to see him.”</p>
<p>Her arms pinned, Arya could only stand there as he tore the hood from her head and the tunic strip from her face. The guards murmured as they saw her for the first time.</p>
<p>Joffrey fell back a step. “A girl?” he sneered. “A girl is the one who kept you chasing your tail all this time, Gendry?”</p>
<p>The gaurds’ gauntleted hands might have been locked painfully around Arya’s arms, but her feet were free. She leaned back against the guard’s chest and kicked out hard, almost catching Joffrey in the groin.</p>
<p>He stumbled back, then curled his lip at her. His hand rose, and he stepped forward, swinging—</p>
<p>Gendry caught his wrist before the blow could land. “Your Highness,” he said, his voice icy. “You won't beat a prisoner in my castle.”</p>
<p>Joffrey yanked his arm away. “I give the orders here,” he said, rubbing his wrist where Gendry had grabbed it. “Just—take her away. Put her in the worst dungeon we have.”</p>
<p>She kept her chin high as they frog-marched her from the room, but couldn't make herself look at Gendry. The other guards fell in, two in front of her, two behind. She tried to feel honored that they felt that so many guards were necessary, but her spirits fell farther and farther with each step down through the castle towards the dungeon.</p>
<p>
  <em>At least they’ll call off the Faceless Men. At least my friends are safe.</em>
</p>
<p>If only she could return to them.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Chapter 11</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The news that the bandit of the wolf’s hood had been captured traveled fast. By the next morning, the entire town was buzzing about it, and as Gendry passed through the streets, he could feel the townspeople’s stares on him, hear their hushed voices all around.</p>
<p>He could imagine what they must think of him. He’d never been able to find out why, but he knew they looked up to the bandit, respected her. They’d resent him for taking her away, even though they didn’t seem to know the bandit was Nan.</p>
<p>Gendry made his business short and retreated back to the castle. He thought perhaps he would not feel so tense, so suffocated, there, but he did not. As soon as he stepped through the gates, all his thoughts went to the dungeon.</p>
<p>He had to see her. He had known from the moment Joffrey ordered her to the dungeons that he would have to go talk to her there. What he did not expect, however, was that he would find himself half-running down to the dungeon before lunchtime. He paused only briefly before he reached the bottom, trying to catch his breath—he didn’t have an excuse to give his guards as to why he was in such a hurry to speak to her. </p>
<p>The Nottingham dungeon hadn’t been too much used since Gendry had arrived; only two other cells were occupied. Nan paced through hers, stalking from corner to corner, only a few paces each way.</p>
<p>Gendry came to stand by her cell. He had known he would find himself here—why on earth had he not thought of anything to say?</p>
<p>Nan’s eyes landed on him, and she jerked to a halt. “There you are.”</p>
<p>“Nan, I’m sorry. I didn’t—”</p>
<p>“Did he do it? Did Joffrey call off the Faceless Men?”</p>
<p>“Yes. I saw his letter myself, and I sent it off with the morning post.”</p>
<p>Nan let out a long breath, the tense set of her shoulders easing.</p>
<p>“Nan, I’m sorry. I didn’t—”</p>
<p>“Sorry? For what?”</p>
<p>“For—well—” He gestured around them.</p>
<p>“I was the one that snuck in here. I was the one that got myself cornered,” she said bitterly. “You don’t owe me anything.”</p>
<p>“But Nan, still, I never wanted you locked up in here—I’m so sor—”</p>
<p>“What did Joffrey mean, last night?”</p>
<p>His stomach fell to somewhere around his feet. “What?”</p>
<p>“He said something about a deal. Something about holding up your end, and his mother would hold up hers. What did he mean?”</p>
<p>Gendry wanted to cover his face, to hide from her steely glare, but he made himself face her properly. “The queen made me a bargain, when she appointed me to be sheriff,” he said quietly, “that if I caught the bandit leader—if I caught you—and brought you to the queen’s justice, she would legitimize me.”</p>
<p>Nan started. “Legitimize?”</p>
<p>“I’m King Robert’s bastard.”</p>
<p>She rocked back a step. Whatever she had expected, evidently it wasn’t this.</p>
<p>Finally he had told her, and now the rest came out in a flood. “I’m his bastard, and now he’s dead, and my mother went five years before he did, and I don’t have any other family. But Cersei told me that if I catch you, if I bring you to the queen's justice, that she would make me a real Baratheon. I’d join the family, I’d <em>have</em> a family, I’d have a home.”</p>
<p>Nan’s eyes were wide, but beneath her shock, Gendry could almost see her mind whirling. He waited, afraid, for her to speak, fearing her anger at hiding this from her, or her righteous indignation that he’d bargained her life for a name.</p>
<p>Instead, she began to laugh. He frowned at her. “What’s so funny?”</p>
<p>“All this time, you hid your name from me,” she told him. “What is your surname, then? Waters?”</p>
<p>He pressed his lips together and nodded.</p>
<p>“You’ve hidden your name from me, and I’ve hidden mine from you,” she went on. There was something tired in her laugh.</p>
<p>“You’ve—do you mean your name isn’t Nan?”</p>
<p>She gave him a crooked smile. “Are you surprised, Gendry? That I didn’t tell you my real name?”</p>
<p>The thought pierced him, but she was right; he wasn’t surprised. “What is your name, then?”</p>
<p>She considered him for a long moment before answering. “Arya.”</p>
<p>“Arya.” It was a pretty name. “Arya, I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>She snorted. “For what?”</p>
<p>“I arrested you,” he reminded her.</p>
<p>“You want me to blame you?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “For doing your job?”</p>
<p>“Arya, you know I don’t—I mean—in the cellar—”</p>
<p>It was hard to tell in the dimness of the cell, but her cheeks looked a little pink. “Gendry, if there’s anything I understand,” she said softly, “it’s the feeling of missing a family.”</p>
<p>“What do you mean?”</p>
<p>She sighed and wrapped her arms around her middle. “I was angry. I was waiting for you to come down here so I could tell you exactly what I thought about any deal you might have made with Cersei, but… that might have been the one deal you could’ve made that I would understand. Even if it was with her. But Gendry,” she added, “are you sure the Baratheons would <em>be</em> your family?”</p>
<p>“I know there aren’t many of them left,” he admitted. “But I have cousins, and most of the vassal houses are related to us. I don’t know why they wouldn’t.”</p>
<p>“Families aren’t always born, Gendry,” she said, and for once there was nothing sharp about her, nothing of steel in her face. “Sometimes you can make them out of the people around you. I did, and I didn’t even notice until yesterday.”</p>
<p>“I don’t have anyone around me,” Gendry admitted, looking down. “Just you.”</p>
<p>Her feet appeared in his vision. She had stepped closer to him, close enough to look up into his downturned face. His heart began to thud. “Would you have been my family, Arya?” he asked her.</p>
<p>She searched his eyes. “I don’t know. Maybe. But that’s not possible now, is it?” She tapped the bars between them.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>The whole way back up to his study, where he was supposed to meet with Joffrey to plan Arya’s execution, Gendry’s mind raced.</p>
<p>What if she would have been his family? If she could somehow get free, would she still?</p>
<p>But how was she possibly to get free? The dungeon was half underground; to get out, she’d have to make it past the guards, the servants, through the hall and the courtyard and the bailey, and then out the gates and through the entire town, without being seen or caught.</p>
<p>Could he possibly help her? He shouldn’t—but he had spent too much time recently dithering over what to choose, between Arya and the Baratheon name. He would have to make a choice, and soon.</p>
<p>Lost in his thoughts, Gendry would have walked right into the messenger if the boy hadn't skidded to a stop in time. “At the gate, ser,” he panted. “A noble lady. Says she has to see you.”</p>
<p>Gendry frowned down at him. Was there some meeting or guest he had forgotten to prepare for? “What lady? Did she say why she has to see me?”</p>
<p>“A Lady Stark, sir. Says you’re holding her sister prisoner.</p>
<p>
  <em>A noble lady’s sister? But the only woman prisoner we have is…</em>
</p>
<p>It was all Gendry could do to stay standing. “Take me to her.”</p>
<p>The boy led him to the entrance hall. A young woman, a few years older than Arya, stood in the middle. She wore a sweeping dress and an air of regality that Gendry had rarely seen before. <em>Only on Cersei,</em> he realized with a start. </p>
<p>He approached her and bowed. "Lady Stark, is it?"</p>
<p>"It is." She didn't look much like Arya—their hair and eyes were different colors, and Arya's face was longer. "You are the sheriff?"</p>
<p>"Yes, my lady. What can I do for you?"</p>
<p>"Is it true that there is a young woman in your dungeon whom you arrested attacking Prince Joffrey? A young woman with brown hair and grey eyes?"</p>
<p>Gendry glanced around at the guards watching them curiously from around the edges of the hall. "Perhaps somewhere a bit more private," he said, gesturing for her to follow. She nodded and swept after him into an unused storage room, furnished only with a brazier and an old table. "Now," he said, "what interest do you have in this prisoner?"</p>
<p>"I want her released," said Lady Stark.</p>
<p><em>If only.</em> "My lady, I don't have the power—the prince wants her dead—"</p>
<p>She examined him cooly. "I don't care what the prince wants. She is my sister, and she is a noblewoman. She will not be executed without a trial."</p>
<p><em>Ah—there's the resemblance. </em>Lady Stark's blue eyes held the same sharp steel as Arya's grey. Gendry chose his next words carefully. "My lady... would you tell me your sister's name? To verify she is who you say she is."</p>
<p>"Her name is Arya Stark." </p>
<p>Gendry wanted to sit down, but there were no chairs in the room. He made do with leaning against the table. <em>Even when she told me her name, she didn't</em>. But he found, like her, that he couldn't be angry about it, couldn't blame her. She was a noble on the run—a Stark on the run.</p>
<p>Gendry didn't know the details, but some time back, the town gossip had been all of the Starks. Lord Stark court-martialed and executed in the south for disobeying Cersei's orders. The young lords turned traitor afterwards, defecting to the Dragon Queen. Two of them lost in battle afterward, and another lost to the desert. Of course she hid her name. <em>Of course she understands missing family.</em></p>
<p>Her sister watched him closely. "You didn't know who your own prisoner is?"</p>
<p>"She's full of surprises, is all," he muttered, his head still spinning. "And she doesn't act much like a lady."</p>
<p>"You do know her," said Lady Stark, her mouth twitching. "Now help me save her."</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Chapter 12</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Being cooped up in a cell only four paces wide, without so much as a cot, left Arya feeling sore and cranky. She took to long periods of stretching, trying to find a way to stretch every muscle she could think of. She was holding her foot behind her back to stretch her thigh when a guard smacked his spear against the bars. The clang made the prisoner in the nearest cell flinch, but Arya just glared.</p>
<p>“You have a visitor,” he told her, and stepped aside. Sansa appeared behind the bars.</p>
<p>Arya’s heart almost stopped, and her foot thudded to the ground.</p>
<p>“You look surprised to see me,” Sansa said, just as cool and haughty as ever. “Did you think I was dead too?”</p>
<p>“It was better this way. It was safer that you not know where I was. For both our sakes.”</p>
<p>“Was it?” Sansa snapped. “It wasn’t enough that we lost everyone else—you had to let me think I’d lost you too?”</p>
<p>Arya wanted to snap back, to defend herself, to fall back into the bickering and arguing that had made up their childhoods together, but she couldn’t. A rush of guilt filled her. Sansa was right—they had lost too much. She opened her mouth, trying to find the words to apologize.</p>
<p>“Mother, too, now.”</p>
<p>Arya froze in horror. “What?”</p>
<p>Sansa gripped the bars of Arya’s cell, leaning against them and closing her eyes, looking suddenly very tired. “I’ve had a letter from Jon. Mother made it to Morocco, but she was attacked outside of the city, when she went looking for Bran. She’s not coming home either, now.”</p>
<p>Arya stepped up to her, wishing she could hug her, afraid to even touch her hands. “Sansa, I’m sorry,” she whispered. There was a tremor in her voice. “I’m sorry I didn’t meet you like I said I would. I’m sorry I didn’t let you know I was okay. I’m sorry I let you bear all of this alone.”</p>
<p>“Why did you?”</p>
<p>“When our carriage was attacked, and we split up, I got cornered by some of the bandits. I managed to convince them to take me prisoner instead of killing me, and then I made friends with a couple of them. One of them looks just like Jon,” she said, trying to smile. “The leader didn’t like me much, but he got himself killed a few weeks later, and I convinced them to just let me join them.”</p>
<p>“Why would you want to do that? Instead of coming to me and Uncle Edmure in Leeds?”</p>
<p>“I couldn’t…” Arya shook her head. “I couldn’t keep sitting around in castles doing nothing. The bandits were already stealing—I convinced them to only steal from the Lannisters. I figured that was the only way I could hurt Cersei, for now.”</p>
<p>Sansa snorted. “Of course you did.” She reached through the bars and took Arya’s hands, squeezing them lightly. “I want to be angrier at you for it. You know, I passed through Nottingham once, last winter, and I could have sworn I saw you. I told myself I didn’t want to go back to look, but I cried myself to sleep that night.”</p>
<p>Arya couldn’t find any words, so she just squeezed Sansa’s hands back.</p>
<p>“But then this morning I heard that the famous bandit of the wolf’s hood had been captured. A bandit who wore wolfskin, who was a young woman, who was caught trying to kill Joffrey Lannister. It could only have been you.”</p>
<p>“I wasn’t trying to kill him. Not yet, anyway.”</p>
<p>Sansa gave a quiet laugh.</p>
<p>“You shouldn’t have come, though,” Arya went on. “They’re going to execute me. And you shouldn’t have come anywhere near Joffrey—you know he was coming for you, in Leeds—”</p>
<p>“Yes, I know. But I already thought I’d lost you, Arya. I couldn’t stand by and let you die again.” Her voice was thick, and she cleared her throat. “Anyway, they won’t be hanging you just yet. I spoke to the sheriff. He’s going to convince Joffrey to give you a proper trial.”</p>
<p>it was Arya's turn to snort now. “What sort of proper trial do you think they’ll give me?”</p>
<p>“I don't know, but if nothing else, this will buy us some time to figure out another plan,” Sansa pointed out. “I’m sure you’ve been trying to concoct a way out of here.”</p>
<p>Arya didn’t reply to that, mindful of the guard still standing only a few paces away. <em>Trying being the operative word.</em></p>
<p>“I have more good news,” Sansa went on, with the hint of a smile. “Mother may not have found Bran, but Bran found Jon. He’s safe. Injured, but safe.”</p>
<p>Arya closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against the cell door. Sansa mirrored her, her skin just barely touching Arya’s between the bars. “I’m glad,” she said. “But with Mother… I wish I could be happier about it.”</p>
<p>“Me too.” Sansa straightened. “The sheriff said your trial will probably be the day after tomorrow. I’ll be staying in the castle until then. And if there’s a way to convince them you’re innocent, I’ll find it.”</p>
<p>“They caught me with my sword at Joffrey’s throat, and you think there’s some way they’ll let me off?”</p>
<p>“I’m not going to let them execute you, Arya.” She pitched her voice lower. “I think I may be able to convince the sheriff to help me. He didn’t seem too keen on the idea of hanging you.”</p>
<p>Arya’s cheeks burned, but she couldn't find anything to say to that.</p>
<p>“I’ll come see you again, if they let me,” Sansa said, beginning to pull her hands away.</p>
<p>Arya held on. “Wait. Sansa, I think you need to stay away from Joffrey. He was headed to Leeds before, and I think he was going to get you. Jon is still fighting against the crown, after all, and you’re the only Stark left in England. The only one anyone knows about, anyway.”</p>
<p>Sansa gave her a crooked smile. “Not anymore.”</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>It hadn’t been as difficult as Gendry feared to convince Joffrey to postpone the execution until after a trial. He reminded him that the law guaranteed a trial for nobles; that he would be seen as a fair and just ruler, and be more beloved by his subjects, if he followed the law; and through gritted teeth, he suggested that holding a trial would attract more attention, so that there might be a larger audience at the execution. This last idea is what seemed to have sold it.</p>
<p>He had sworn the messenger boy to secrecy regarding Lady Stark’s arrival, then given Sansa quarters in the farthest corner of the keep from Joffrey, with strict instructions to her guards to inform him of any attempt the prince might make to enter the room. She had told him of Arya's warning, and he couldn't help but agree.</p>
<p>Now he had only to toss and turn in bed until morning. <em>Help me save her</em>, Sansa had said. With all his heart, Gendry wanted to do so, but he knew they needed more help. And he only had one idea as to where to find it.</p>
<p>The castle was quiet enough as he dressed and made his way down to the stables and readied his horse. He mumbled something to the guard at the gate about wanting to check on the city watch, mumbled something to the watchman about wanting to check on a particular farmer, and took his horse at a fast lope out into Sherwood Forest.</p>
<p>In all honesty, he wasn’t sure how to accomplish what he was thinking of. He didn’t have a clue where to find Arya’s bandit friends, and even if he did, he had no idea how to convince them to listen to him.</p>
<p>He rode into the depths of the wood and drew his horse to a halt. The forest was dark, the leaves just barely limned with the first grey hints of dawn. The bandits had to be around here somewhere, he knew. If only they had put up a helpful sign to their camp—but Gendry knew that he would either have to find them himself, or help them to find him.</p>
<p>He cleared his throat. “Here goes nothing,” he muttered, already feeling rather stupid. Then he began to shout.</p>
<p>“Oy! Bandits! Bandits of Sherwood Forest, that follow the Wolf’s Hood! It’s me, the sheriff! I have your leader captive, and I’ve come to parley!”</p>
<p>His voice echoed through the trees, but no reply echoed back. He kicked his horse back into motion, riding up and down the road, shouting all the while. He kept it up until his throat grew dry and sore, but except for the rustle of branches and the start of the morning birdsong, he heard no answer.</p>
<p>He wasn’t surprised, but he his heart plummeted. <em>Now what? </em>It would take days to properly search the forest, time he didn’t have. Without their help, he wasn’t sure what to do.</p>
<p>He could only keep trying. He started back down the road again, shouting as loud as he could through his sore throat. The forest brightened as the sun rose, filling first with the grey mist of dawn, then with the golden light of the morning. Finally, he looked up to see a young man on the road. He had a round face and curly hair, and Gendry thought he recognized him from town. He ran right towards Gendry, his eyes wide.</p>
<p>“Sheriff—is it true? Is it true you caught her? The Wolf’s Hood?”</p>
<p>Gendry looked the young man over again, trying to judge whether he was just a local who had passed by at an inconvenient time. “Yes, it’s true.”</p>
<p>The young man’s face, previously open and earnest, hardened. A knife, the big heavy kind that cooks used, appeared in his hand. “You’ll let her go,” he said, clearly trying to sound threatening despite the nerves in his voice.</p>
<p>“Who—”</p>
<p>An arrow flew past Gendry’s nose, burying itself in a tree on the other side of the road. He jerked back, almost tipping himself off of his horse, and looked toward the treeline. A man in a yellow cloak stood there, holding a small recurve bow.</p>
<p>“Now, hold on a—” Before he could finish, someone grabbed him from behind and dragged him from the saddle. He landed on his backside, knocking the back of his head hard on the packed earth. A third bandit stood over him, a longbow drawn in his hands, the arrow pointed right at his chest.</p>
<p>Despite himself, Gendry broke into a grin. “Oh thank God,” he said. “I’ve been looking for you.”</p>
<p>“We know you have!” said the first man, the one with the cook’s knife. His voice was still somewhat shrill. Gendry would’ve bet that he hadn’t done anything like this before; he felt confident that he hadn’t seen him on any raids, at least. “But we found you first, right, and you’re going to let—”</p>
<p>“Oh, right—listen, I’m not trying to arrest you anymore. I’m looking for you because I want you to break her out of my dungeon.”</p>
<p>“You—what?” The three of them exchanged looks. “We’re not falling for that,” called the one in the yellow cloak, still standing under the trees. “You really expect us to believe that you’ll let us walk right into your castle and take one of your prisoners?”</p>
<p>“No, no, not—not like that, anyway. The prince would hang me too. But—”</p>
<p>“But nothing,” said the longbowman, still standing over him. “We’ve got you right where we want you, and none of us are going anywhere until—”</p>
<p>“Until what?” Gendry burst out. “Her trial is tomorrow, we don’t have any time to lose! It has to be tonight.”</p>
<p>“Trial?” repeated the round man. “She’s getting a trial? She’s not going straight to the gallows?”</p>
<p>“No, her sister—”</p>
<p>“She has a sister?” the longbowman muttered.</p>
<p>“Look, I just—I never wanted to arrest her. I’ve known who she is since you tried to kidnap the prince, and I knew where to find her, and I didn’t arrest her.”</p>
<p>“You did arrest her,” snapped the longbowman, drawing the string a hair farther back, “or how’d she get into your dungeon?”</p>
<p>“She snuck into the castle,” Gendry replied drily, “to try to force Joffrey to call off the assassins his mother sent.”</p>
<p>The man in the yellow cloak snorted. “Of course she did.”</p>
<p>“She didn’t tell you what she was doing?”</p>
<p>The first man let his knife drop, his shoulders sagging with it. “No, he said. “She was just gone. Didn't come home last night. And then we heard the rumors.”</p>
<p>“Don’t just chat with him,” snapped the longbowman. “That’s not what we’re here for.”</p>
<p>“Please,” Gendry said. “I’ll tell you whatever you need to know, as long as we get her out of there tonight.”</p>
<p>“We?” called the man in the cloak.</p>
<p>“How do we know this isn’t a trap?” asked the longbowman.</p>
<p>“Be—because she—that is, because I—” Gendry couldn’t find anything to say that didn’t sound ridiculous. <em>Because I can’t bear to see her hanged? Because I think I've fallen in love with her?</em> He scowled to hide his embarrassment.</p>
<p>To his surprise, the longbowman began to laugh. “I guess it wasn’t one-sided,” he told the others. “This might be worth a shot. What do you say?”</p>
<p>The round man nodded. “Let’s go get her.”</p>
<p>The cloaked man hesitated. “You’re sure? He’s not just acting?”</p>
<p>“No, I can see the look in his eye. That's a hard look to fake.” He relaxed his bow and offered Gendry a hand up. “Mind you,” he added, “if it does turn out to be a lie, you’re a dead man.”</p>
<p>“I believe you.” Gendry took the proffered arm. “Now, can we please get started? She doesn’t have long.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The last chapters will be up tomorrow :)</p>
<p>Hope y'all enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Chapter 13</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya already felt like she was going mad, cramped up in this little cell. She slept only fitfully, and rose before dawn to pace some of her energy off. Come noon, she hadn’t stopped.</p>
<p>A rustle sounded near her cell door. She spared half a glance towards it, figuring it was another servant come to bring her midday ration of water, stale bread, and cheese that tasted just a little off. But instead of the lanky young boy who’d brought it the day before, this time the plate sat in the hands of a familiar little girl.</p>
<p>Finally, Arya stopped pacing. “Hello.”</p>
<p>The girl just looked at her. Slowly, Arya came up to the bars and crouched to the girl’s eye level. “What do they call you?”</p>
<p>Still the little girl didn’t reply, just pushed Arya’s plate through the little slot in the bottom of the bars.</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Arya took a bite of the bread. It was just as stale and hard as she’d expected.</p>
<p>The lanky boy from yesterday had fled the dungeon as soon as he’d delivered her food, and only returned an hour later to pick up the plate and run away again. This girl, however, stayed where she was, darting glances between Arya and the grimy floor.</p>
<p>As Arya’s jaw worked to chew the old bread, she looked the girl over. “You look better than before,” she said around her mouthful. “Like they’ve been feeding you well.”</p>
<p>The girl nodded.</p>
<p>“Do you have somewhere warm to sleep, too?” Arya tried the cheese. It tasted even stranger than the cheese from yesterday, and she put it back on the plate.</p>
<p>The girl shook her head.</p>
<p>“Do they keep you very busy?” She nodded again, and Arya tilted her head. She lowered her voice, not wanting the guard to hear in case the girl got in trouble. “Are you supposed to be somewhere working right now?”</p>
<p>Finally the girl looked right at her. “I can get the key,” she said, barely louder than a breath. “To your cell. The bailiff has one.”</p>
<p>Arya dropped what was left of the bread. “What?”</p>
<p>“I can get it for you.”</p>
<p>Arya stared at her. “No. That's too dangerous.”</p>
<p>The girl shook her head. “I can do it. I take him his supper today too. He won't notice.”</p>
<p>Arya could see it in her mind’s eye—the girl’s little fingers working the key from its ring while the bailiff ate his own, likely fresher, meal, none the wiser. As soon as she thought it, she shook the image away; this girl was just a little kid. “I can’t ask you to do that,” she said softly. “But I promise I’ll figure something out on my own.”</p>
<p>The little girl looked her dead in the eye. “Not before they hang you,” she said. Before Arya could reply, the girl reached into the cell, grabbed the plate, and trotted off.</p>
<p>For the rest of the day, Arya paced in even more agitation than she had before. Her supper came just before the watch changed, carried by the same little girl, and something glinted on the tray when she slid it into Arya's cell.</p>
<p>Arya stared at it, impressed despite herself. “Please, won’t you tell me your name?”</p>
<p>The little girl gave her a shy smile. “They call me Weasel.”</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Gendry struggled to look like he was listening as Joffrey droned on. He was planning how to conduct Arya’s trial, reciting different accusations with relish, stopping now and again after he’d cracked a cruel joke. Gendry had only to nod and fake a smile, and Joffrey would go on, either unaware or uncaring of Gendry’s distraction.</p>
<p>Finally, the moon rose, sliding into Gendry's view through the far window. <em>It's time.</em> He stood and made his excuses to Joffrey.</p>
<p>“Yes, fine, go,” the prince said, waving a hand at him. “You’ll need your rest for tomorrow. It’s going to be glorious. I’ll string the wolf bitch up myself, right after the trial.”</p>
<p>Gendry couldn’t fake a smile at this, so he sketched a bow instead so that Joffrey couldn’t see his face, and left. He took the stairs at half a run, forcing himself to slow as he reached the ground floor. Trying to look normal, he made for the wine cellar.</p>
<p>Anguy and Little Jon were already there, halfway through changing into the plain guardsmen’s tunics that Gendry had stowed there. He waited for them to finish, fidgeting nervously. “Remember,” he said, “keep quiet, stay behind me, and—”</p>
<p>“Yes, we know, act like your lackeys,” said Anguy.</p>
<p>“The guardsmen aren’t my—look, just act your part.”</p>
<p>“Please, ser,” Anguy said at once, “may I have permission to walk near you, ser? May I have permission to—”</p>
<p>Gendry groaned. “That's not your part.”</p>
<p>They followed Gendry back to the keep. It was largely empty at this hour, though they passed a few guards on patrol. “Remember,” Gendry muttered as they reached the stairs down to the dungeon, “you're the change of the guard. I’ll dismiss the old ones, we’ll get her out of her cell, and then—”</p>
<p>A figure appeared at the base of the stairs, and he clamped his mouth shut in case they should hear him. Then they looked up.</p>
<p>“Gendry?”</p>
<p>He stopped short, grabbing the wall to keep from pitching down the stairs as Anguy knocked into his back. “Arya?”</p>
<p>“Arry!” Little Jon pushed past Gendry.</p>
<p>“Little Jon—what—” She gaped him, then shrank back, looking almost fearful. “How’s Lommy?”</p>
<p>Little Jon ruffled her hair, smiling. “He’s going to be fine.”</p>
<p>“Wait!” Gendry ran down towards them, Anguy on his heels. “The guards—”</p>
<p>“All taking a nap,” Arya said.</p>
<p>“A nap?” Gendry stepped past her and peered down the length of the dungeon. All three guards lay strewn on the ground. “You didn’t kill—”</p>
<p>“No, they’re just unconscious.”</p>
<p>He looked her up and down. Her knuckles were bleeding, and she was breathing a little hard, but she was uninjured. “You did for all three of them?”</p>
<p>“Who else do you think did it?”</p>
<p>Gendry knew he shouldn’t be getting warm feelings about anyone who’d knocked out his own guardsmen, but there they were. “Well, then,” he said gruffly. “Let’s get on with it.”</p>
<p>“Get on with what? Wait—”</p>
<p>Little Jon raised his fist, but Arya caught it before he could swing. “What are you doing?”</p>
<p>“I can’t go with you,” Gendry said. “I have to stay.”</p>
<p>Her eyes snapped to him. “Why?”</p>
<p>“Well, for starters, your sister is still in the castle,” he said. “From what she said, I don’t think you’d want me leaving her alone within a hundred miles of Joffrey.”</p>
<p>“Then we’ll pick her up on the way out.”</p>
<p>Gendry shook his head, unable to look at her. “If I leave, they’ll just send another sheriff, maybe a better one. Maybe more assassins. I’ll be more help to you here. At the very least,” he added with a crooked grin, “I think I’m the only sheriff in England who would actively try to avoid arresting you.”</p>
<p>Arya looked as if she wanted to argue, but all she said was, “You’re sure?”</p>
<p>He nodded. Something sad filled her face for an instant. Then she turned away, and Little Jon swung.</p>
<p>His fist connected with the side of Gendry’s head, sending him hard to the ground, where the other side of his head smacked against the stone floor. Stars burst across his eyes, and he couldn’t help the groan that escaped him.</p>
<p>Arya crouched next to him and touched his shoulder. “Sorry,” she whispered, and then their footsteps receded up the stairs.</p>
<p>Gendry stayed on the ground for a few moments, nursing his head. He didn’t feel any blood, but his entire skull throbbed. It didn’t matter, though. If it meant Arya could go free, he’d let Little Jon punch him a hundred times. <em>Well, </em>he thought as another throb ran through his head, <em>if I could take a hundred.</em></p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>Arya, Anguy, and Little Jon sprinted up the stairs. At the top, Anguy slipped ahead to take the lead, guiding them back towards the cellar. No one was around to see them, at least not yet, and Arya couldn’t help a bubble of hope from swelling in her chest.</p>
<p>The feeling was short-lived. A brash, too-familiar voice sounded ahead.</p>
<p>Arya slid to a stop, grabbing Anguy and Little Jon. “Joffrey,” she hissed, looking about for somewhere to hide. But they stood in a long stretch of empty hallway, devoid even of a broom closet, and before they could turn back, Joffrey appeared at the end, flanked by four guardsmen.</p>
<p>“—see her face when I sentence—” He stopped at the sight of them, his jaw dropping. “How did—seize her!” he cried, pointing at Arya. “Don’t let her escape!”</p>
<p>The guards charged forward. Arya scowled. “I was hoping we wouldn't have to do this part,” she grumbled.</p>
<p>“I never say no to a bit of fun,” Anguy said, and then the guards were upon them.</p>
<p>Little Jon seized one in each hand. Anguy tripped one and landed a punch to another's kidney. Arya rolled past them, pausing only to yank a spear from the guard Anguy had put on the ground, and sprinted for Joffrey.</p>
<p>He was still shouting, his shrill commands echoing down the hall. Arya ducked her head and ran faster, raising her spear. Joffrey barely got his sword drawn in time to knock it aside, but she spun it around and brought the staff down hard across the back of Joffrey’s knees. He stumbled, his sword arm flying up as he tried to keep his balance, and Arya aimed for the opening—</p>
<p>Someone caught her around the middle and threw her back. A new pair of guards, summoned no doubt by Joffrey’s screaming, stood over her. Snarling, she spun her staff about, sending them out of reach to avoid it, and leapt back to her feet.</p>
<p>The guards closed in in front of Joffrey. Arya could only see the top half of his face behind their shoulders. She bit her tongue on a curse. She had been this close to getting him. Part of her knew she should let it go, should focus on getting out. There would be another day to fight, when she had her bow in hand, and her sword.</p>
<p>But he was right there. <em>Besides, I can't leave Little Jon and Anguy behind.</em> She bared her teeth and swung her spear towards the guards.</p>
<p>The spear had never been her chosen weapon, but she knew the basics, and in this cramped hallway, her smaller size worked to her advantage. <em>Crack</em>—she landed a hit hard against one of the guard’s heads. His eyes rolled back and he dropped. His fellow stabbed at her midriff and she leaped back, spinning her spear forward to keep him from getting any closer. He stabbed again—she blocked it, but the force knocked the spear from her hands.</p>
<p><em>Shit</em>. She dove beneath his next strike, rolling behind him. Quick as a cat, she lunged to her feet and kicked his leg out from under him. He fell as Arya seized another spear from the guard she’d hit and swung it around to hit him on the side of the head, too. His eyes slid shut.</p>
<p>Two guards lay on the floor by Anguy and Little Jon, but they still had three up to contend with. Only one was left near Arya, hovering uncertainly between her and Joffrey. The young guard's eyes darted down to the unconscious men at her feet. He swallowed hard, fear plain on his face, but lunged for her.</p>
<p>She hadn't expected him to attack and barely got her spear up in time. As they traded blows, however, a flash of movement over his shoulder caught Arya’s eye. Sansa stood at the end of the hallway, behind Joffrey, gaping at the scene before her.</p>
<p>Arya was only distracted for an instant, but it gave the guard his chance. He struck her hard in the middle of the chest with the staff of his spear, driving the breath clean out of her lungs. She doubled over, wheezing, the spear falling from her hands. She felt him grab her tunic and drag her forward, and then someone else seized her by the arm.</p>
<p>“Enough!” came Joffrey’s voice, right over her shoulder. “You’re defeated! I’ve got her!”</p>
<p>Little Jon let out a bellow and shoved aside the guard in front of him, but pulled up short before he could go more than a step. Arya felt something cold at her throat. Trying not to move her head, she looked down past her nose and saw the patterned gleam of Damascus steel.</p>
<p>“All of you,” Joffrey snarled, “to the dungeons, now, or I’ll—Gendry! There you are. These men have broken in to try to free this bandit. Arrest them at once.”</p>
<p>Arya sucked in a breath. Gendry stood behind Little Jon, wide-eyed as he took in all the guards on the ground. He looked up at Arya, saw the sword at her throat.</p>
<p>“Gendry!” Joffrey tried again. “Did you not hear me? I told you to arrest them. Hurry up, and we can hang them all together this afternoon.”</p>
<p>Arya watched Gendry’s face. He seemed a little dazed, perhaps from the surprise, perhaps from Little Jon’s punch, but other than that she could read nothing in his face. Her stomach clenched.</p>
<p>
  <em>I have to stay, he said. His choice is already made.</em>
</p>
<p><em>It isn’t</em>, another part of her insisted. <em>He said he’d stay to help keep you out of jail. He can’t do that now. He can't free you and keep his position.</em></p>
<p>Her mind began to whirl, trying to think ahead. He might try to keep his chance at legitimization, however slim. He hadn't broken his word to the queen yet—that she knew of, anyway.</p>
<p>Joffrey’s grip on Arya tightened. “Gendry! Can you not hear me?” His blade pressed closer to her neck, and she leaned her head away from it.</p>
<p>Gendry held his hands up. “I can’t arrest her if she’s dead, Joffrey.”</p>
<p>“You—”</p>
<p>Joffrey’s head slammed forward over Arya’s shoulder. His sword fell away, his hand slackened, and Arya leapt away from him, punching straight into the guard’s throat when he reached to grab her. He dropped like a rock, holding his neck, and Arya turned back to see Sansa standing over Joffrey, a small stone bust of the late king in her hands. “Sorry I took so long,” she said, a little breathlessly. “I had to find something to hit him with.”</p>
<p>Despite where they were, Arya had to laugh. Behind her, she heard the sounds of Anguy and Little Jon dealing with the remaining guards, but she just stepped over Joffrey and threw her arms around her sister. Sansa hugged her back, a bit awkwardly, still holding the heavy bust.</p>
<p>“Time to go,” said Little Jon behind her. </p>
<p>On the ground next to her, Joffrey stirred and groaned, one bleary eye cracking open. “Se-seize her,” he croaked, scrabbling for his sword. “Throw her back in the dungeon, and tomorrow I’ll hang—”</p>
<p>Gendry strode up and grabbed two fistfuls of Joffrey’s shirt, hauling him up. “Shut up, you stupid shite. You’ll do no such thing,” he said, and headbutted Joffrey square in the face. As the prince groaned more threats through his now-crooked nose, Gendry asked, “Do we have anything to tie him up with?” </p>
<p>Sansa pulled the belt from her dressing gown and handed it to him, and Anguy helped him bind Joffrey’s wrists and ankles. They left him hogtied on the ground, and Arya didn’t bother to ask this time if Gendry was coming with them.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Home stretch now :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Chapter 14</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They slipped out through the kitchens and by dawn had collapsed onto pallets in the bandits’ camp. After a few hours’ rest, Sansa took her leave.</p>
<p>Arya walked with her almost halfway to the next town, to a small farm where she knew the farmer had an extra horse. She paid him for its use, and with a deep breath faced her sister for a proper farewell, this time.</p>
<p>“I wish you would come with me. Oh, I know you can’t,” Sansa added, seeing Arya’s mouth open. “I know you’re a wanted criminal, and you have things to do here. It’s just…” She looked away. “I just found you again."</p>
<p>Arya hugged her tight. “I know. I’m sorry, again.”</p>
<p>“Don’t get caught,” Sansa said as they pulled apart. “It’s a lot of trouble to rescue you, you know. And a lot louder than I expected.”</p>
<p>“I’d have rescued myself, if you’d given me a little more time.” She grinned and stepped back, holding the horse’s reins as Sansa mounted. “Be careful on the road.”</p>
<p>“Be careful robbing the queen,” Sansa replied dryly. “Be careful avoiding the noose.”</p>
<p>Arya smiled. “I’ll see you soon.”</p>
<p>Sansa nodded, her eyes bright. “I’ll write to Jon, tell him you’re okay. And I’ll talk to Uncle Edmure about what we should do now.”</p>
<p>“Best get going, then.” Arya stepped out of the way, exchanged one last smile with her sister, and slapped the horse on the rump. She waited until Sansa was out of sight before turning back towards home.</p>
<p>The walk had taken the whole morning, and by early evening Arya was still a couple of miles out from camp. But she began to hear the sound of hammering ahead and slowed her pace, unsure what to make of it. The noise grew closer, and after a moment’s deliberation Arya slipped into the trees and crept along parallel to the road until she drew level with the sound. Keeping her footsteps light, she hid in the brush near the road to see its source.</p>
<p>Two men were hammering sheets of paper onto the trees along the roadside, accompanied by a cadre of guards. They moved a few dozen feet down and tacked up two more, then two more, lining both sides of the road.</p>
<p>Arya watched until they were out of sight, then went to take a closer look at what they had posted.</p>
<p>Her face stared back at her from one tree, and Gendry’s from the next, beneath the word “Wanted.” She looked at Gendry’s poster longer. He was a wanted man too, now, because of her. She tore down one of each poster and turned her steps again toward home.</p>
<p>*****</p>
<p>In Arya’s absence, Gendry spent the entire day sitting rather awkwardly in the the midst of all the bandits had spent the last couple of months trying to arrest. He suspected that they would not have tolerated his presence if Anguy and Little Jon hadn’t made a point to trade off keeping him company. Anguy in particular kept talking loudly about what had passed in the castle, recounting the story anew to anyone unwise enough to come within his reach.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until evening that Arya reappeared, a pair of wrinkled papers clutched in one hand. “We’ll have to get you a hood now, too,” she told Gendry, handing them to him.</p>
<p>He looked down at the poster in his hand. <em>Wanted. Arya Stark, Bandit of the Wolf's Hood. Wanted alive or dead. </em>And on the next: <em>Wanted. Gendry Waters, Former Sheriff of Nottingham. Wanted alive.</em></p>
<p>It was a strange feeling, seeing his face there, seeing how utterly he had destroyed the life he’d had—the life he thought he was going to have. He felt as if he were looking on from a great distance, but to his surprise, nowhere in that distance could he find any regret.</p>
<p>“Your hood may not be very helpful anymore,” he said, tapping her poster. “Since they're advertising it.”</p>
<p>She shrugged. “It was never just about hiding my face. Besides, I didn't stop wearing it after you started asking about it, either."</p>
<p>“True enough." He looked up at her. "So that’s it, then? We just go back to robbing tax wagons?”</p>
<p>“Well, <em>we</em> go back to robbing them.” There was a touch of uncertainty in her eyes. “We’ll have to discuss what you’ll be doing. Away from this lot.” She gestured over her shoulder, where the others were making no pretense about their attempts to eavesdrop.</p>
<p>Arya led him into the woods and away from their prying ears, settling into an easy stroll once they were a ways away from camp. The moon had risen, a bright full moon, and the forest was made of silver and shadow beneath its light. “If you still want to go to the Baratheons, I won’t blame you. You’re under no obligation to help what we’re doing here.”</p>
<p>He couldn’t answer for a few steps, searching for words. “No,” he said at last. “You were right. Families can be made. I think I’d rather do it that way.”</p>
<p>“So... you do want to stay here? And rob the tax wagons with us?”</p>
<p>“I do.”</p>
<p>“You’re sure?”</p>
<p>“I’m already a wanted man. I don’t think a bit of robbery will make much of a difference.”</p>
<p>“They didn’t want you dead, though.”</p>
<p>“I’m not so sure,” he said darkly. “I imagine Joffrey probably just wants to kill me himself.”</p>
<p>Arya snorted. “Fair point.” She stepped in front of him and held out a hand. “Welcome to our little troupe, then.”</p>
<p>He shook it, but didn’t let go immediately. “About what you said—before. When we were talking about family, in the castle. About…” Even in the cool night air, his cheeks were burning.</p>
<p>“About… me being your family?” Arya’s voice was quieter than usual. “Time will tell, I guess.”</p>
<p>“Right.” He cleared his throat and let go of her hand, but she didn’t move away. Instead, he felt her hands on his shoulders, felt her lean up towards him, felt the brush of her lips on his cheek.</p>
<p>“Thank you. For helping me.” She stepped away, a bit too quickly. “I’m glad to have you with us, Gendry Waters.”</p>
<p>He ducked his head, unsure whether she could see his blush under the moonlight. “Glad to be with you,” he said gruffly.</p>
<p>They started back towards camp. “So those posters—those rewards. That seems like a good way to squeeze some more gold out of the Lannisters,” Arya said. “What do you say to collecting our own bounties?”</p>
<p>“If you can figure out how to make it work, I’m happy to try.” He followed her back towards the distant firelight of the camp. He had a feeling deep in his gut that he would be following her for a long time yet, wherever she went.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Art!!</p>
<p>As this fic is part of the 2020 Gendrya BigBang, I am delighted to present you with the following wanted posters, as featured in this chapter, fantastically drawn by @sklirotiri:</p>
<p> <br/></p>
<p>Look how cool they are! Amazing! Beautiful! Terrific! I can't get over it!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Chapter 15</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Last chapter! Thank you for reading, and thank you all for the lovely comments; they mean a lot. I hope you'll enjoy the end ^_^</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You’re still rotating your elbow up,” Arya said as they walked, tapping the offending joint. “That’s why your string keeps hitting you arm, your elbow’s getting in the way.”</p>
<p>“I didn’t miss the rope because the string hit my arm,” Gendry grumbled.</p>
<p>“Oh, I know. You missed because your aim is still terrible.” She grinned at him. “It’ll get better in time. After more practice.”</p>
<p>He groaned, but only half-heartedly. It might have been tedious to spend such long hours on target practice, but Arya spent most of those hours with him, checking his technique, offering him pointers, and that wasn't so bad.</p>
<p>Besides, he didn’t just learn about archery. He learned about her, too. He learned that she had learned to shoot from her father and her older brothers, that she had quickly outshot her younger brothers even though she began learning after them. He learned about her childhood dog, Nymeria, and about her loathing for embroidery. In fact, he learned quite a lot about her. It was easy to do, living as they did in a small group, but he treasured every new tidbit, every new glimpse of her self.</p>
<p>He also found that he enjoyed his new life as a thief. Banditry didn’t come naturally to him, but his knowledge of the workings of the Nottingham guard did turn out to be helpful.</p>
<p>They had needed all the help they could get. The manhunt for him and Arya was fierce, and now that the Dragon Queen had died—slain in battle, at the head of her troops, and buried with honors on the Mediterranean coast—and the war in the south was winding down, they assumed that Cersei would be turning more attention to solving her problems at home—problems like Sherwood bandits. Guards had begun to comb the forest, forcing them to relocate their camp four times so far.</p>
<p>Despite that, Arya’s idea to claim their own bounties had paid off, and now they returned to their latest camp with several fewer arrows and a lot more gold than they'd had when they left. Anguy, Lem, and Little Jon walked a few paces behind them, joking about the day’s fight.</p>
<p>“You know, we may want to lay low for a while,” Gendry suggested, trying to distract from his own missed shots. “They almost had you, by the bridge. I think they’re getting frustrated.”</p>
<p>She snorted. “If they’re frustrated, they should get better at their jobs. And he didn’t <em>almost</em> have me. He barely got within arm’s reach.”</p>
<p>“If he was within arm’s reach, I think that counts as almost.”</p>
<p>“But he never touched me. If he got within arm’s reach but still couldn’t lay a finger on me, it doesn’t count.”</p>
<p>“He got too close for you to shoot.”</p>
<p>“Close enough for me to grab his spear. Close enough for me to knock him into the stream.”</p>
<p>Gendry couldn’t help but laugh. “Fine, then. It wasn’t almost. Are you happy now?”</p>
<p>She dipped him a mocking curtsy. “Very happy. Thank you for admitting your mistake.”</p>
<p>Gendry shook his head. “I should have known you were a noble all along. You curtsy too well to be anything but.”</p>
<p>“I was raised to be a lady, remember,” she replied. “Although if my mother could see me now, she’d be appalled.”</p>
<p>He watched grief sweep over her face. “Would she?” he asked. “You’re trying to avenge your family. From what you’ve told me about her, I think she would appreciate that. And I think mothers want us to be what suits us. You don’t suit being a lady. You suit being a…” He waved his free hand about, the one that wasn't carrying a hefty bag of gold. “A… wild forest lass.”</p>
<p>She blinked up at him, the heavy sadness in her eyes easing. After it faded, she put on her sharp grin. “I like the sound of that.”</p>
<p>When they arrived at camp, Hot Pie greeted them with hot rabbit stew and a letter. Arya stopped dead at the sight of it, but relaxed when she saw her name on the outside. “It’s my sister’s handwriting,” she said, and broke the seal.</p>
<p>Gendry and the others left her to it, storing their weapons and beginning to divvy up the reward money into more coin purses. They kept up a low chatter as they worked, but Arya barely heard it. Her world had shrunk to the words on the page in front of her. “Jon’s coming.”</p>
<p>Little Jon looked up from tying off a full coin purse. “What? Did you need something?”</p>
<p>“No, sorry, not—not you. My brother Jon.” Her voice trembled, and the group fell silent to listen to her. “He’s coming back. With an army.” She looked up and found Gendry’s eyes. “He’s leading the Dragon Queen’s army north, to take on the Lannisters for the throne.”</p>
<p>“I thought the Dragon Queen was pinned down in Italy when she died. Thought they were all routed,” Anguy said.</p>
<p>Arya waved the letter. “Apparently they won the battle, something about reinforcements from the Martells. They’re marching for England now. Sansa heard it from Jon himself. He should be here in a fortnight.”</p>
<p>“Surely the navy will keep him out, though,” Little Jon said, but his eyes were wide. “An invasion on England’s shores—they wouldn’t possibly—”</p>
<p>“She says his chances are good.” Arya was smiling, not her sharp grin, but a joyous beam. “Apparently the queen hasn’t been well, ever since her brother ran off with that lady night. And the navy is the smallest it's been in years. Sansa says the queen has been having some revenue trouble. Not enough tax money coming in, between the harvest being smaller than usual, and other—” She looked back at the letter. “—<em>interruptions</em>, she calls them.”</p>
<p>The men broke out into whoops and cheers. “That can’t possibly be just us?” Gendry asked.</p>
<p>“I don’t know, and I'm not sure I care,” Arya said with a laugh. “It’s good news either way. Hot Pie, where’s the ale?”</p>
<p>“So when do you leave?” Little Jon asked, raising his voice over the sound of fresh cheers as Hot Pie hauled out a barrel.</p>
<p>“Leave?” Arya blinked. “What do you mean?”</p>
<p>“Aren’t you going to join him?” Little Jon asked. “Your brother, when he arrives. Aren’t you going to go help him fight the Lannisters?”</p>
<p>Arya’s face fell. “I can’t,” she said quietly. “I can’t leave the people here, not when the guardsmen are out harassing everyone for information about me, and—”</p>
<p>“We can take care of them, Arya,” Anguy said, clapping a hand on her shoulder. “You go find your brother.”</p>
<p>Arya looked around. Lommy and Lem were nodding, and Little Jon smiled at her. Gendry smiled too, but he looked a little sad as he did.</p>
<p>They spent the rest of the evening in high spirits, but Arya found that, happy though she was, she couldn’t quite join in the others' drinking and celebrating. She kept returning to her letter, rereading this passage or that line, over and over, until a gust of wind tore the page from her hand. It sailed right toward the fire, saved only by Lem's quick catch. After that, she tucked the letter into her pocket and looked around for something else to occupy her mind. Perhaps Gendry wanted to do a little target practice before bed—but as she looked around, she caught sight of his broad back fading into the woods. Without stopping to think about it, she followed and called after him.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” he asked, pausing for her to catch up. “You need rest, if you’re going to be traveling.”</p>
<p>“I don’t have to go immediately.”</p>
<p>“But you will.”</p>
<p>She wanted to deny it, but knew that the words would be a lie. “It’s a long way to go alone, you know.”</p>
<p>He stopped and faced her. The setting sun edged his face in gold. “I’d follow you, if you’d let me.”</p>
<p>Her answer was immediate. “Then come with me.”</p>
<p>A gust of a sigh escaped him. “Oh thank God,” he said, and swept her up in a hug.</p>
<p>Arya hadn’t hugged many people outside of her family. She froze at the feel of his arms around her, her heart thumping.</p>
<p>He felt her tension. “Ah—sorry. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, I just—”</p>
<p>He tried to let go, but Arya caught his arms before they could leave her waist.</p>
<p>“Arya?”</p>
<p>“I’m glad you’re coming,” she whispered. And then, before she could think too much about it, she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his.</p>
<p>For an instant he froze, too—then his arms were tight around her again, lifting her up and spinning her about. He laughed under her mouth, and she broke away in laughter, too, before kissing him again.</p>
<p>They stayed like that for a few long moments, kissing between their smiles, before Gendry put her down. Her laugh was breathless by now. “I’m very glad you’re coming.”</p>
<p>He bent to lean his forehead against hers. “I’d go with you anywhere, Arya Stark.”</p>
<p>She pulled away but kept hold of his hand. “Then come with me back to camp. We should get some rest, and start packing. We have a long way to go, and a war to win.”</p>
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